Kylian Mbappe camp celebrates ‘exceptional’ PSG court outcome

Robin Bairner

• 17 Dec 2025 05:00 CST
• 4 min read

Nieuws

Kylian Mbappe’s lawyers have rubbed salt into the wounds of PSG following a court ruling that the Champions League winners must pay the Real Madrid star €61 million in unpaid wages and bonuses.

On Wednesday, it was announced by the labour court that a long-running dispute between Mbappe and his former club had fallen in favour of the France attacker.

The 26-year-old was awarded €61m after claiming that PSG still owed him a signing bonus, vacation pay, three months' wages, ethics bonuses for the same period as well as holiday pay related to bonuses.

PSG’s narrative backfired, claims Mbappe lawyer

To make matters worse for the Ligue 1 champions, they were forced to publish the result of the ruling on their website, where it will stay on the homepage for a month - something Mbappe’s lawyers took particular delight in.

“Kylian wasn’t fighting a personal battle. Kylian was fighting a battle of principle,” lawyer Delphine Verheyden explained.

“When you work, you deserve to be paid. By requesting these posts on PSG’s homepage, the idea is that this deserves recognition.

“There was a debate about images behind the scenes and a desire to damage Kylian’s image. It’s not right. What other options do we have besides making it known what really happened? We have done everything to bring these matters to light.

“He’s relieved and he’s happy. I’ve represented him for 10 years; he’s determined and passionate about his work. He’s satisfied and glad it’s over. He’s got great confidence in the work done by his team.”

Another of the player’s lawyers, Thomas Clay, told RMC: “They managed to establish a narrative that they are now seeing backfire on them.

“Why didn’t they pay? Out of price. They couldn’t accept their star player was going to Real Madrid.”

Why PSG are unlikely to appeal

Despite the celebrations of Mbappe and his camp, PSG still have a month to appeal the ruling, which could drag the legal battle out for several more months.

Antoine Sappin, a labour law specialist for Ascent Avocats, explained to L’Equipe that PSG had largely managed to limit the damage in this case and suggests the club will not do that.

“They were not convicted on the sensitive points, such as compensation for undeclared work, damage for psychological harassment or even the reclassification of fixed-term contracts as permanent contracts,” he said.

“Since PSG were ordered to pay the minimum amount – even though €61m for an employee is a completely exceptional award, perhaps even the biggest handed down by an employment tribunal – there is a significant rusk that PSG, if they appeal, could be ordered to pay much more. The judges of the Court of Appeal are professional judges, and they will rule based on the law rather than equity.”

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