Recently, Spanish La Liga player Mbappé caused strong dissatisfaction among Chinese fans after making inappropriate remarks about China in a French program. After the incident, the Chinese Football Association immediately communicated with Real Madrid Football Club, CCTV completely stopped broadcasting matches involving the Spanish football league and Mbappé, multiple platforms banned his accounts, and several companies announced they would terminate their cooperation with him.
On October 27th, Mbappe himself, La Liga officials, and the French media involved all publicly apologized. Real Madrid remained silent, simply sharing Mbappe's apology statement.
According to Spanish media outlet 'okdiario', Real Madrid stated in relation to this incident that the club considered the remarks to be those of individual players, and Mbappe himself has made a public clarification and formal apology. The club also revealed to Western media that its Chinese sponsors understand the circumstances surrounding the matter, and their business relationship remains unchanged, continuing as normal.
Real Madrid emphasized that although Chinese companies such as Dongpeng Beverage and Mengniu have announced the termination of their partnerships with Mbappé, these are individual commercial agreements between the players. They do not equate to the cancellation of sponsorship at the club level, nor can it be concluded that the club has suffered economic losses that it has never been informed of.
Real Madrid also stated that Mbappe never intended to offend anyone, and they uphold and respect the players' right to express their personal opinions.
Using the turmoil caused by their players as "personal remarks" or "unintentional mistakes" is a common tactic used by Real Madrid in crisis public relations. The Spanish newspaper Marca also mentioned that Real Madrid has remained silent about this incident, largely because they lack experience in handling such situations. In the past, Real Madrid's foreign players have never caused such serious backlash in non-European markets, and the club's public relations plans do not even include procedures for dealing with fundamental issues like those related to the Chinese market.
The French newspaper L'Équipe also revealed in its latest report that there was a rift within both La Liga and Real Madrid when dealing with this situation. According to reports, just one day before the public outcry began, La Liga, aware that the related statements could spark significant controversy, warned Real Madrid and proposed that the league intervene to help Real Madrid overcome the negative impact of this situation. However, due to the long-standing poor relationship between the two sides, Real Madrid directly rejected this proposal.
The French media also said that some high-ranking officials from Real Madrid not only failed to show gratitude, but even took a "fancy-watching" attitude, wanting to see how the Spanish Liga chairman Tebas, who relies heavily on the Chinese market, would fare. This morning, Tebas issued a statement saying that he had met with China's Ambassador to Spain, Yao Jing, to discuss the controversy caused by Mbappé's remarks and seek a solution.
Mbappe's three-language apology letter was independently issued by his personal team after assessing the crisis public relations situation. L'Équipe criticized Mbappe's team's public relations strategy as extremely shortsighted: they spent a lot of effort maintaining Mbappe's public image in European and American markets, but failed to restrict him from making inappropriate statements in public about other regions. As a result, they ruined a valuable market that took years to build.
Additionally, L'Équipe pointed out that Mbappé, as the captain of the French national team, has had his remarks turned into a sensitive diplomatic incident. In France, calls are ringing non-stop, from the French Football Federation to the diplomatic level.
