Real Madrid and La Liga apologise to China over Mbappe comments

Chinese beverage giant Dongpeng has scrapped its partnership with the player, as did dairy firms Mengniu and Milkground.

Updated : Oct 28, 2026 19:40 IST , Madrid - 3 MINS READ

Kylian Mbappe’s comments, on a French TV show, have caused widespread anger in China. | Photo Credit: Reuters

Real Madrid apologised to China on Wednesday for Kylian Mbappe’s comments poking fun at Mao Zedong, after the star striker’s remarks sparked a social media storm and saw Spanish football removed from state TV.

Mocking former leader Mao is taboo in China, and Mbappe’s remarks saw him become the latest foreign sports figure to anger Beijing.

In a clip of an interview with the French show “The Bridge”, since taken down, Mbappe talked about being amused by an internet meme of his face photoshopped onto “some guy, think he’s a Chinese dictator”, an apparent reference to Mao.

Real Madrid “wishes to express its apologies to the Chinese people for any offence caused by the recent remarks of our player Kylian Mbappe”, the club said.

“The club joins in the public apology issued by Kylian Mbappe, in which the player himself expressed his regret for his words and reiterated his respect for the Chinese people,” the 15-time European champions said.

The statement came a day after Mbappe issued his own apology, in French, Chinese and English, saying: “My comment was ill-judged and I now understand that it hurt many people in China and in Chinese communities around the world.”

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Foreign ministry spokesman Guo Jiakun told a regular briefing on Wednesday: “We take seriously the apology the individual concerned has made.”

La Liga, which saw the broadcast of its matches suspended in China, said on Tuesday it “deeply regrets the offence that Kylian Mbappe’s recent comments have caused among Chinese fans”.

Earlier, the state-run Global Times said in an editorial that it was “not difficult to see that the club’s longstanding tolerance of such behaviour has contributed to Mbappe’s latest offensive remarks”.

Chinese beverage giant Dongpeng, which during this year’s World Cup ran adverts with AI-generated images of Mbappe, said Tuesday it had scrapped its partnership with the player, as did dairy firms Mengniu and Milkground.

CMG, which oversees public broadcaster CCTV, said it had decided to suspend broadcasts of La Liga.

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Mbappe, 27, continued to face a torrent of criticism from Chinese web users on Wednesday, some of it racist.

Mbappe’s original joke about Mao was not reposted from China’s tightly controlled social media. Chinese social media app Xiaohongshu had meanwhile frozen Mbappe’s account, where he has over a million followers.

The same was done on the Weibo app, with a notice stating that “the user has been banned from following due to violating laws or the Weibo Community Convention”.

Chinese media reports said global brands like Dior and Hublot have removed their Mbappe-related content on Weibo.

At the Adidas flagship store in Beijing’s Sanlitun shopping district, Real Madrid shirts was available for sale, but none bore the striker’s name.