Kylian Mbappé had to wait for 191 seconds to take a penalty he won himself. The lengthy delay did have a say in the outcome, as the French skipper was enraged and confronted the referee, who halted the play for a hydration break shortly afterwards. The incident only caused more outrage on the internet as fans also questioned the delay.

Mbappé made his way into the box in the quarterfinal clash between France and Morocco at the FIFA World Cup 2026. Morocco’s Noussair Mazraoui brought Mbappé down, and the Argentine referee, Facundo Tello, pointed to the spot in the 25th minute. However, a lengthy VAR check was conducted on the field to seemingly confirm an open-and-shut penalty incident.

After 3 minutes and 11 seconds, Mbappé was finally given the go-ahead to take the penalty. He was subjected to all kinds of taunts from Moroccan fans and players during the delay, and it led to him taking a poor penalty. Yassine Bounou dove to his left and comfortably parried it away. Visibly frustrated after the miss, Mbappé didn’t join his teammates during the hydration break called immediately after the penalty.

He argued with the referee and was seen asking him about why the three-minute delay ensued. The game resumed and ended 0-0 at halftime. After this, the internet blew up.

“Argentine Referees took so long to confirm a straightforward penalty, which was saved by the Moroccan goalkeeper. The penalty was indeed very poor from Mbappé,” a fan tried to ask questions about the referee’s integrity after the controversial decisions continued to plague the World Cup.

“That was f*****g suspicious from the ref. Why did they make him wait so long?” a fan was equally puzzled by the delay in the VAR decision.

“They would have changed the penalty taker; he waited so long and lost,” another fan believed Mbappe should’ve passed the chance to a colleague after losing focus.

“It’s obvious VAR was looking for any reason possible to overturn,” another felt, as they believed the referees were going to intervene in the game.

A successful penalty could’ve seen Mbappé go level with Lionel Messi on top of this FIFA World Cup’s scoring charts with eight goals. Messi himself missed a penalty during Argentina’s round of 16 clash against Egypt.

Messi responded with a goal and an assist in a controversial comeback to help his team book a quarterfinal spot. Mbappe has to keep calm and lead his team from the front as the winner awaits a date against either Spain or Belgium in the semis. The game remains 0-0 at the time of writing.