Kylian Mbappé's Mission: Win the World Cup for Deschamps

Kylian Mbappé doesn’t just want to win this World Cup for France. He wants to make sure Didier Deschamps never sits in another dugout again.

Not because the bond is broken. Because it runs too deep.

Mbappé’s plea to his mentor

Deschamps is heading into his final tournament in charge of Les Bleus, yet he has stayed deliberately vague about what comes next. He has not closed the door on anything: a return to club football, another national team, a fresh challenge abroad. All of it is on the table.

Mbappé is trying to slam some of those doors shut.

Inside the France camp, the captain has made no secret of his attempts to sway his coach’s thinking. Speaking to M6, he laid out the stakes in his own way.

"The best way to pay tribute to him is to win because he loves to win. We're going to make sure he has the best of the recent World Cups. Hopefully, it will be his last because I hope he doesn't play for another team."

That last line said everything. For Mbappé, Deschamps on another bench is not a romantic second act. It is a scenario to avoid.

So he has turned up the heat.

"I'm putting pressure on him," he admitted, half-smiling, half-serious – a superstar forward trying to influence the future of the man who shaped his international career.

Italy links that make Mbappé shudder

Deschamps’ name has circled around one job more than any other: Italy.

The links are obvious. He knows the country, knows the culture. He wore the Juventus shirt, then returned to manage the club. His reputation as a stabiliser, a serial organiser of winning teams, fits neatly with what the Azzurri crave as they try to escape a cycle of chaos and missed World Cups.

On paper, it looks almost too perfect. A four-time world champion nation, searching for order and identity, turning to a World Cup-winning coach who understands the weight of a shirt and the grind of a qualifying campaign.

Mbappé wants no part of that vision.

Asked directly about the prospect of Deschamps in the Italian dugout, the France captain didn’t bother dressing up his response.

"They said Italy, that would be awful," he said.

No diplomacy. No careful phrasing. Just a blunt verdict from a player who clearly cannot picture his long-time coach barking instructions in Italian blue.

One last shot at glory

For now, all of that sits in the background. Speculation, phone calls, quiet conversations between agents and federations – they will wait.

Inside the France camp, the focus is far more immediate. After the heartbreak of the 2022 final, when Les Bleus came within a penalty shootout of defending their crown, this group is chasing a different kind of ending: a world title and a farewell worthy of Deschamps’ era.

The 2026 World Cup will close his chapter with France. No extensions, no extra cycles. One last run.

Before he even thinks about what comes next, Deschamps must drag this squad through another month of pressure, scrutiny and expectation, trying to squeeze every last drop from a group that has lived almost its entire modern life under his command.

The path begins against Senegal on June 16 in Group I. A tricky opener, a physically demanding test against a side that rarely gives anything away. Then Iraq on June 22, a different kind of puzzle, before Norway four days later to close the group – a match that could decide seeding, survival, or something far more dramatic.

For Deschamps, it is a final campaign. For Mbappé, it is a mission: win the World Cup, send his mentor out on top, and make the idea of another national team job feel unnecessary, even unthinkable.

If France pull it off, the question will not be who wants Deschamps next. It will be whether he can ever be tempted to start all over again.