PARIS – In a defining moment of his already storied international career, Kylian Mbappé etched his name into French football history on Tuesday, netting a brace against Senegal at the 2026 FIFA World Cup to surpass Olivier Giroud as Les Bleus’ all-time leading goalscorer.
The 27-year-old Real Madrid striker found the back of the net twice in France’s 3-1 victory, pushing his national team goal tally to 58 – one clear of Giroud, who retired from international football following the 2022 World Cup in Qatar. The milestone caps nearly a decade of elite service for France, with Mbappé’s first senior international goal coming nine years after he first pulled on the iconic blue jersey.
Looking ahead, Mbappé will have immediate opportunities to extend his record. France is set to face Iraq in Philadelphia next Monday, before wrapping up Group I play against Norway in Boston four days later. If France advances deep into the tournament, the 27-year-old is also on track to break the team’s all-time appearance record. He has now earned 99 caps for his country, just four behind former manager and ex-captain Didier Deschamps’ 103 appearances, and is on pace to surpass goalkeeper Hugo Lloris’ existing record of 145 caps if he stays fit, a mark widely expected to fall before the end of his international career.
Beyond his new all-time national scoring record, the World Cup milestone also added another entry to Mbappé’s growing collection of global tournament honors. His two goals against Senegal brought his career World Cup goal total to 14, moving him past French legend Just Fontaine, who scored all 13 of his World Cup goals at the 1958 tournament in Sweden. That puts Mbappé just two goals behind the all-time men’s World Cup scoring record of 16, shared by former Germany striker Miroslav Klose and Argentina’s Lionel Messi – who ironically scored a brilliant hat trick in his own World Cup fixture just hours after Mbappé hit his brace against Senegal.
A deep dive into Mbappé’s career statistics reveals a pattern of historic achievement from the earliest days of his international tenure. He made his France debut as an 18-year-old substitute in a World Cup qualifier away to Luxembourg in March 2017, and scored his first senior goal just five months later against the Netherlands at the Stade de France in August that same year.
He has notched three hat tricks for France to date, each more notable than the last. His first came in 2021 during a World Cup qualifier against Kazakhstan, where he scored four goals alongside Karim Benzema. The second came in the dramatic 2022 World Cup final against Argentina, and the third during a record 14-0 European Championship qualifying win over Gibraltar in 2023.
Between early June 2023 and late March 2024, Mbappé notched a goal in seven consecutive international matches, the longest scoring streak of his France career. Off the pitch, he has maintained a remarkably clean disciplinary record, picking up just 10 yellow cards and never receiving a red card in nine years of international play.
Mbappé also holds a unique place in World Cup final history. He has scored in two separate men’s World Cup finals: against Croatia in 2018, when he was just 19 years old, and against Argentina in the 2022 final. He is only one of two players ever to score a hat trick in a men’s World Cup final, joining England’s Geoff Hurst, who achieved the feat in the 1966 final against West Germany. He joins Zinedine Zidane as just the second Frenchman to score in two separate World Cup finals, and is only the second teenager ever to score in a men’s World Cup final, alongside Brazil legend Pelé, who hit the net in the 1958 final as a 17-year-old.