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The economics for the largest stars in world football are remarkable, and France's Kylian Mbappe is certainly among the greatest superstars in this sport.
That will be on display on Monday at the 2026 FIFA World Cup when the French squad takes on Iraq, and the disparity between Mbappe's value and that of Iraq's whole team is startling.
Before the World Cup, Forbes did a study in which they compared the transfer value of the top players to the combined values of all the players on other teams.
Mbappe is worth 8.5-times more than Iraq's whole roster.
MORE: Lamine Yamal outdoes Messi, Ronaldo in historic moment for Spanish wunderkind
The ratio from Forbes: $206 million value for Mbappe, $24 million combined value for Iraq.
The only wider gap in this entire World Cup already happened, when Norway's Erling Haaland took on Iraq.
The value for Haaland comes in at $229 million, putting him a bit ahead of Mbappe.
It really does drive home a bit about the haves and the have-nots at this expanded World Cup.
There was concern before this grown tournament (from 32 to 48 teams) that there'd be more mismatches due to the addition of smaller nations.
Some of the small teams, like Cape Verde, have made themselves look like they belong.
But this statistic about Mbappe vs. Iran really emphasizes what it can look like in modern sports. Some players are worth more than 20% of a billion dollars.
Some teams are worth barely a tenth of that.
MORE: Cape Verde captures the magic of sports
Not all footballers are created equal, that's for sure.
Mbappe is coming off two goals in his first game of this World Cup, including a late screamer against Senegal.
Iraq may simply not be up to the task. The financials certainly say they aren't.
More FIFA World Cup news:
- USA, England can't actually play on July 4th
- Why Norway brought 600 pounds of salmon to the World Cup
- Eloy Room leads Curacao to astounding World Cup history
- It had to be Mo Salah for Egypt
- How Folarin Balogun's mom being too pregnant to fly led him to USMNT
Billy Heyen
Billy Heyen is a freelance writer with The Sporting News. He is a 2019 graduate of Syracuse University who spent his senior year following Jim Boeheim's basketball team around the country. His reporting work has also included extensive high school sports coverage at the Sandusky Register and Rochester Democrat & Chronicle. Adventures in sports writing have also led to in-person coverage of the Buffalo Sabres, Cleveland Guardians, U.S. men's national soccer team and a variety of minor league baseball stories. When people ask if he's seen a movie, the answer is usually "No, I was probably watching sports." Even away from sports, his main hobby is running (much slower than any athlete in these pages).
Source: Sporting News
