9 reasons global superstar Kylian Mbappe should join my synagogue soccer team

Did someone say orange slices?

When you’ve joined the good guys. Photo by Catherine Steenkeste/Getty Images

By Louis Keene February 15, 2024

Kylian Mbappe became the most coveted free agent in the history of soccer on Thursday, after announcing he will leave Paris Saint-Germain at the end of this season. Most prognosticators think the 25-year-old French superstar will be snapped up by Real Madrid, but it’s hardly a done deal.

Mbappe will want to carefully consider all his options — especially once he hears what my synagogue’s Sunday six-on-six team has to offer.

Our squad, Hapoel YP, hasn’t won a game since joining our LA rec league last fall, and we wouldn’t be able to come close to the $72 million annual salary Mbappe currently commands. (We have scored some goals, to be fair, and I will personally cover his $2 ref fee.) Also, he would have to join our shul to be on the team, which would require him to convert to Judaism, a process that can take years. But let’s not get hung up on minor details!

Here are 9 perfectly excellent reasons Mbappe should join our team:

1. We never practice

Look: Mbappe, you’ve played hundreds of games for club and country since bursting onto the scene as a teenager. Your legs have got to be tired.

At Hapoel YP, you’d be taking passes from working parents. You think we’ll be running you ragged in practice? Buddy, we don’t even have practice.

You can spend your weekdays and weeknights eating to your heart’s content at the same three kosher restaurants.

When the young professionals’ minyan is thriving and inclusive. Photo by Catherine Steenkeste/Getty Images

2. We aren’t owned by Qatar or sponsored by the UAE

Hapoel YP has zero ties to oil barons or the fossil fuel industry. A Qatari government-backed investment fund owns your current team and Emirates Airlines are Real Madrid’s jersey sponsor. We don’t have a jersey sponsor, though we do have jerseys!

There have been rumors that we are in sponsorship talks with Founders Ale House, a sports bar in our Pico-Robertson neighborhood. (I need to send the owner an email.) That’s right: The only sportswashing Hapoel YP does is sucking down cold beers after the game.

And while we do drive to our matches, we generally carpool, doing our part against climate change. Mbappe my friend, we will pick you up. I bet the guy with the hydrogen-fueled car will even let you ride shotgun.

3. We’ll never make him play goalie

A common problem in recreational leagues: Who plays goalie? I hereby commit that Hapoel YP will never make Mbappe play goalie. Zev and Oded have a good rotation going anyway. Also, once Mbappe joins us, is the other side ever going to get the ball?

4. Our fans are honestly so encouraging

Paris Saint-Germain fans are notoriously impatient and fatalistic, scarred after six years of Mbappe-led squads that never won a European final. And the domestic league it plays in, France’s Ligue 1, has struggled with violence, racism and homophobia in the stands.

Hapoel YP’s passionate fanbase of spouses and small children has zero tolerance for hate. Even when we’re losing 7-0, they never boo.

And I highly doubt that Real Madrid fans bring snacks to share with the players. Did someone say orange slices?

5. I keep getting injured

My damned heel!

When Melissa pulls up with the Gatorade cooler. Photo by Mike Hewitt/Getty Images

6. He will for sure be the best player on the team

Hate to say it, but by the time Mbappe joins Real Madrid — whether before or after his inevitable stint with our club — the fans will have already fallen in love with another star, English wonderkid Jude Bellingham, who joined in 2022. The Guardian deemed Bellingham the second-best player in the world in 2023 — and Mbappe third.

The Guardian doesn’t consider Hapoel YP players for its rankings, but we would pretty much know that Mbappe’s our best player. Although, watch out — my teammates keep saying that I’ve “improved a lot.”

7. The shul gala is right around the corner

There’s no better way to support our shul than tax-deductible donations that go toward an open bar. And lest you forget, this year’s gala honorees are — repeat after me — models of dedication to our community. So, too, can you be, Mbappe, perhaps by gala 2028.

8. We are guaranteed to not be knocked out of the UEFA Champions League this year

Mbappe has been prematurely eliminated from the top-flight European competition several years in a row now. True, Real Madrid has won more Champions League trophies than any other club, but where’s the fun in that? We’re not even guaranteed to win a game!

9. There’s plenty of room for him on the bench

Oh, you thought Mbappe would just naturally slide into our starting lineup? Who did you think would sit, exactly?

Louis Keene is a reporter for the Forward. His work has also been published in The New York Times, New York Magazine and VICE. He is based in Los Angeles and can be followed on Twitter @thislouis.

A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.

Now more than ever, American Jews need independent news they can trust, with reporting driven by truth, not ideology. We serve you, not any ideological agenda

At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.

Readers like you make it all possible. Support our work by becoming a Forward Member and connect with our journalism and your community.

— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO