Kylian Mbappe: Rio Ferdinand tips 'chosen one' to lead Paris Saint-Germain to UEFA Champions League glory

Rio Ferdinand hailed Kylian Mbappe as “the most exhilarating player on the planet” and tipped the Frenchman to lead Paris Saint-Germain to UEFA Champions League glory in what is most likely to be his last season with the club.

A move to Real Madrid is reportedly in the works for the 25-year-old, who has scored 251 goals for PSG in 300 appearances since joining from Monaco in 2018.

However, he has so far failed to help the Parisians conquer Europe and get their hands on the trophy they crave the most.

But with a favourable draw, Ferdinand believes it would be fitting for Mbappe to depart the French capital on a high.

“He is the most exhilarating player on the planet now. The most explosive, the most dynamic, the most devastating player there is in the game,” Ferdinand said on TNT Sports ahead of the first leg of PSG’s quarter-final clash against Barcelona.

“He can hit you from anywhere on the pitch and change the game. There’s great players but they can’t take you from one end of the pitch to the other and then score.

"He can do it any way he wants and that’s why I think he’s unique in that sense. Football needs him now to go to a team like Real Madrid and win Champions Leagues.

“Because we’ve had [Cristiano] Ronaldo, we’ve had [Lionel] Messi, who’ve done that and gone back and forth. He’s the guy who’s going to have to carry it on his own for a while now because I think he’s that good and that far above everybody else.”

He added: “There are people who are the chosen ones. Couldn’t win the Champions League with Messi and Neymar there but 'I’m going to leave after my last year and sign off and win the Champions League for Paris'.

“That’s the type of feeling I’m getting.”

Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola recently declared Erling Haaland was “the best in the world”, but Ferdinand is adamant Mbappe is in a league well out on his own.

And asked how you go about trying to stop such a force, he added: “You need numbers. We saw Kyle Walker at the World Cup get close to really snuffing him out of the whole game, but there’s still a time in that game where he gets it out of his feet and gets away from the defender, no matter how good you are.

“It’s a team effort. There are certain players… we saw [Antonio] Rudiger go one-on-one with Haaland and he shut him out the game but it’s not as easy with this guy.

“If he’s smelling a bit weakness somewhere else, he can easily go somewhere else on the pitch and go, ‘Bang, have that!’”

- - -

TNT Sports presents the premium live sports rights previously carried by BT Sport including the Premier League, UEFA Champions League, UEFA Europa League, UEFA Conference League, Gallagher Premiership Rugby, Investec Champions Cup, EPCR Challenge Cup, MotoGP, Cricket, UFC, Boxing and WWE. The streaming home for TNT Sports in the UK is discovery+, where fans can enjoy a subscription that includes TNT Sports, Eurosport and entertainment in one destination. You can also watch TNT Sports through BT, EE, Sky, and Virgin Media.