False! Mbappé not leaving French national team

Claim: A Facebook video shows Mbappé insulting his coach and announcing a plan to leave the French national team after losing to Croatia.

Verdict: False! Mbappé did not announce any plan to leave France. Likewise, he never spoke rudely to his coach on camera. The circulating video was manipulated.

Full Text

A 57-second video of Kylian Mbappé insulting his coach, Didier Deschamps, after Croatia beat France (2-0) in the Nations League quarterfinal first leg on Thursday, March 20, 2025, has started making the rounds on Facebook. Not only did he blame Deschamps for their loss, but he also announced his departure plans from the French national team.

“I have an announcement to make. I’m leaving the French national team until Didier Deschamps leaves,” he stated.

“I’ll go play for Algeria, where my mother is from, because this team stinks worse than Bonnie Blue Cucci. This guy, Didier or Didi or whatever his name is, is a horrible manager. I’ll call him Didi from now on because he’s sabotaging this team like Didi sabotaged his career. He always gets the most stacked teams, and he can’t win anything with them.”

The clip, already liked by over 10,000 people and shared by 441, has generated heated debates among other Facebook users who believed the video to be accurate. 

For some weeks, DUBAWA has been debunking claims, especially manipulated videos of footballers, as seen here, here, here, and here. We conducted this verification due to its potential for misinformation.

Verification

On Sunday, March 23, 2025, France faced Croatia in the second leg of their Nations League quarter-final game. France won 2-0, forcing the match into a penalty shootout, where they triumphed 5-4, eliminating Croatia. Mbappé played for France and even scored a penalty.

We noticed an inconsistency in the circulating video. While Mbappé’s speech matched the mouth movement, the background flipped, causing the text on the wallpaper behind him to appear backwards.

We conducted a reverse image search and found the original version on YouTube. It was a 2-minute and 48-second interview in which Mbappé said France and Croatia were “amazing” national teams but not rivals. This time, the background wallpapers were as they should have been.

“I cannot say rivals because we have nothing against Croatia. It’s an amazing team, but when you have two amazing teams, it’s possible that you play if you want to win some titles. It’s going to be another big game. Croatia is a big nation of football, and we are ready to compete and hope to win tomorrow and Sunday,” Mbappé said.

Mbappe then expressed admiration for his Real Madrid teammate, Luka Modrić, whom he would be playing against in the match with Croatia.

“It’s a big pleasure for me to have him every day on the pitch and tomorrow as an opponent because you also learn from your opponent. Like I said to him, it’s going to be a big, big battle, and I hope to beat him tomorrow,” he told the interviewer. 

Conclusion

Mbappe neither announced plans to leave his France team nor insulted Deschamps, his coach. The video that circulated on Facebook was manipulated.