{"id":2529,"date":"2026-09-08T13:45:55","date_gmt":"2026-09-08T05:45:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dxtynews.com\/?p=2529"},"modified":"2026-09-08T13:45:55","modified_gmt":"2026-09-08T05:45:55","slug":"mbappes-impossible-choice-messi-or-cristiano","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dxtynews.com\/index.php\/2026\/09\/08\/mbappes-impossible-choice-messi-or-cristiano\/","title":{"rendered":"Mbappe&#8217;s impossible choice: Messi or Cristiano?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1000\" height=\"563\" src=\"https:\/\/dxtynews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/image-8.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-2530\" srcset=\"https:\/\/dxtynews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/image-8.png 1000w, https:\/\/dxtynews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/image-8-300x169.png 300w, https:\/\/dxtynews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/image-8-767x432.png 767w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1000px) 100vw, 1000px\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Kylian Mbappe dodged the ultimate question when asked to pick the greatest between Leo Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Speaking on the Ballon d&#8217;Or&#8217;s official social media channels, the Real Madrid forward played his &#8220;wildcard&#8221; to avoid making a definitive choice between Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo. Laughing off the dilemma, he refused to separate the two icons and, despite the interviewer&#8217;s persistence, stood firmly by his &#8220;joker&#8221;.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">That was the &#8216;final&#8217; matchup between the award&#8217;s greatest winners, according to the Frenchman, who navigated several head-to-head brackets before reaching the decisive showdown.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">He initially favoured Ousmane Dembele over Benzema, Rodri, Modric and Kaka, before leaning towards Ronaldinho, whom he subsequently dropped in favour of Ronaldo Nazario.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The Brazilian saw off Cruyff and Platini, but was eventually edged out by Zidane. France&#8217;s new manager fell at the semi-final stage, however, as Kylian Mbappe opted for Messi.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Kylian Mbappe dodged the ultimate question when asked t [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2530,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2529","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dxtynews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2529","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dxtynews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dxtynews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dxtynews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dxtynews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2529"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dxtynews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2529\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2531,"href":"https:\/\/dxtynews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2529\/revisions\/2531"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dxtynews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2530"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dxtynews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2529"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dxtynews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2529"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dxtynews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2529"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}