France forward Kylian Mbappe, center, and forward Ousmane Dembele sign autographs during an official reception at the Elysee Presidential Palace in Paris, Monday, July 16, 2018. France is readying to welcome home the national soccer team for a parade down the Champs-Elysees, where tens of thousands thronged after the team’s 4-2 victory over Croatia Sunday. (Ludovic Marin/Pool Photo via AP)
PARIS — Teenage World Cup winner Kylian Mbappe is giving his bonus to an association that puts sports in the lives of hospitalized children.
The head of Premiers de Cordee (First in Line), Sebastien Ruffin, says two weeks before France clinched the World Cup he was informed that Mbappe would give the group his bonus if the team qualified for the quarterfinals.
French Football Federation chief Noel Le Graet confirmed in Sunday’s Journal du Dimanche that other associations also would benefit from the France forward’s largesse — “about 300,000 euros ($350,000).”
Mbappe mentors the kids, and Ruffin said the player has “very good contact” with them: “I sometimes feel he gets more pleasure playing with kids than they do.”