Real Madrid’s Kylian Mbappe made his feelings known about Carlos Romero’s cynical challenge in Los Blancos’ 1-0 defeat to Espanyol on Saturday night. When quizzed about it, the Frenchman remained silent, but his gesture told the full story.
It was the man in question, Romero, who opened and closed the scoring at the RCDE Stadium via a counterattack. With a sea of orange shirts back tracking, the 23-year-old was found unmarked at the back post and, rather simply, side-footed his volley home.
Albeit still top of the Spanish top flight rankings, one point ahead of local rivals Atletico Madrid, the 15-time European Cup winners will look back on their defeat with sorrow – especially as they believe the goalscorer should have been sent off on the hour mark.
With the score poised at 0-0 and the game seemingly in the hands of Carlo Ancelotti’s men, Paris-born Mbappe was looking to use his combination of pace and power to cause problems for the hosts. He was prevented from doing so by Romero.
Lunging in out of control, the Villarreal academy graduate made little to no attempt to regain possession of the ball, and his studs caught the calf of a spirited Mbappe, who fell to the ground in agony. Elsewhere, Romero walked away with a mere caution.
In the immediate aftermath of dropping points on the road, the 86-cap France international was asked whether he believed Romero should have been shown his marching orders with 30 minutes of regulation time left on the clock. His response was telling.
First of all, Mbappe – widely regarded as one of the best players in La Liga right now – gave a slight shrug as he walked through the mixed zone after losing 1-0. That was before gesturing that he didn’t want to talk about the matter by zipping his mouth shut.
As Espanyol basked in the unexpectedness of their victory over La Liga’s table toppers, Romero downplayed the incident and emphasised that his intention was never to cause harm to the former Paris Saint-Germain poster boy.
I knew it was impossible to stop him in full stride, I tried to stop him as best I could. It was a bit of an ugly tackle, I apologised. It’s something that didn’t go any further, it stayed there.
Much has been made of the French speedster’s move to the Spanish capital from PSG in the summer. Taking a while to hit the ground running, it’s not unfair to say that Mbappe has now found his shooting boots, having scored 21 goals in all competitions.
Ancelotti’s men will have to fix up and lick their wounds pretty quickly as they travel to face Leganes midweek in the Copa del Rey, an encounter quickly followed by welcoming Atletico Madrid to the Santiago Bernabeu in a top-of-the-table La Liga clash.