How Chelsea U12s convinced PSG's new signing Kylian Mbappe he could be a star

French striking sensation Kylian Mbappe has revealed how a game for Chelsea’s Under-12s convinced him he could make the grade in football.

Mbappe, who signed for Paris Saint-Germain last month in an initial loan move that will eventually be worth £166million, was highly coveted even at a young age and spent a week training at Chelsea as an 11-year-old.

The 18-year-old lined up alongside Chelsea prospects Jeremie Boga and Tammy Abraham, who are now out on loan at Birmingham and Swansea.

Needless to say an attack spearheaded by a player who would soon become the most coveted youngster in world football proved too much for a Charlton youth side.

“We played against Charlton, I think, and we won maybe seven or eight nil,” Mbappe told the Telegraph. “I also got to meet some of the first-team players – (Didier) Drogba, (Florent) Malouda – the French-speaking ones and took some pictures with them.”

“An idea has been reinforced since I was a kid - not just because I went to Chelsea. I always thought: ‘I want to be there, I want to be one of those big players who is trying to give people fun out of the game.’

“And I have given everything to reach that objective. Now I am on the other side of the camera, on the other side of the TV. That’s the only difference.”

Chelsea might be entitled to wonder what might have been if they had been able to lure Mbappe away from local club AS Bondy at that age, not least due to the glowing description the France international offered of his week in west London.

“It was a wonderful experience,” he added. “Chelsea was the first great club, the first big club, that I went to visit. So it was a real discovery for me.

“I was coming from my grassroots, amateur club. It was a whole new world. Of course I had an idea what a great football club was like but I was really impressed by the working culture and the mentality of wanting to be better day-in, day-out.”