Mbappé vs a Senator: How France’s World Cup win over Paraguay exposed football’s racism problem — again
After eliminating Paraguay from the ongoing 2026 FIFA World Cup, France skipper Kylian Mbappé has become involved in an online battle with Celeste Amarilla, a senator from the South American nation.
At the end of the game, Paraguayan goalkeeper Orlando Gill attempted to shake Mbappe’s hand, but the Real Madrid striker refused to acknowledge him. Celeste Amarilla, a 61-year-old lawyer representing Paraguay’s Authentic Radical Liberal Party, posted the remarks on X after her country’s elimination on Saturday.
She wrote, “This brute hasn’t even learned to write. Instead of breastmilk, he grew up sucking on coconuts, and the most educated creatures he ever heard were chimpanzees. You should’ve given him the middle finger, Orlando Gill (Paraguay GK). A colonized Cameroonian, pretending to be French, resentful, newly rich, arrogant, and ugly. He was nervous and scared to death all game, like his whole team. They didn’t even manage to score a single goal, until they got lucky with a penalty. The only thing many of us blame the team for is not giving him a full-handed slap at the end of the game. I’m not even a football fan.”
Mbappé, whose father is from Cameroon and whose mother has Algerian heritage, responded directly on X: “You are a despicable woman and unworthy of your position. You do not represent Paraguay, that country which has sweated passion and honour throughout the competition.” He went further, calling her an “incompetent woman who gives the worst possible image of her country,” and vowed, “I will never allow people like her the freedom to spread their hatred and racism across the world.”
The prior incident
The game which was widely expected to be an easy win for France has now generated a lot of controversy off the pitch. In the buildup to the game, former Paraguay goalkeeper José Luis Chilavert had already stirred controversy by describing France’s squad as “a squad from Africa,” leading French federation president Philippe Diallo to call the comment a “disgrace,” condemning them as undermining “the values of respect, fraternity, and diversity” in football.
Taken together, Amarilla’s and Chilavert’s comments point to a pattern, a recurring willingness in parts of the football world to racialise France’s multi-ethnic squad. The French Football Federation confirmed on Monday that it is pursuing judicial action over Amarilla’s remarks, calling them “utterly abhorrent and unacceptable.”
Even French President Emmanuel Macron weighed in, framing Mbappé’s response as a symbolic second goal: “Against racism this time… When words defile, our values respond: dignity, respect, fraternity.”
Online critics responding to Mbappe’s message have pointed out the irony of condemning someone for racism using language that leans on gendered insults, since calling a woman “incompetent” or “despicable” as a woman risks reinforcing the same stereotype Mbappé is objecting to when applied to race. Some even argued that the gendered insults are incidental and that the real story is the racism, not the phrasing of the response to it.
None of this affects the football itself. Mbappé’s 70th-minute penalty sent France into a quarter-final against Morocco on Thursday, as Les Bleus continue their pursuit of a third World Cup title. Yet, the incident adds to a growing pile of racism controversies threading through this tournament, and puts fresh pressure on FIFA and CONMEBOL (South America’s football confederation) over how they intend to formally sanction Amarilla or Chilavert, neither of whom holds any position within football’s governing structures, which limits what football authorities alone can actually do beyond public condemnation.
Amarilla has demanded that Mbappe retract his comments and apologise or face a lawsuit for gender-based violence.
