Haaland, Mbappe or Messi – who’s most popular?

While Erling Haaland, Kylian Mbappe, and Lionel Messi were all amongst the goal scorers last night, it was 27-year-old Mbappe who proved himself to be the most popular player amongst soccer fans globally, according to insights from Sportradar.

The Company handles betting tickets on behalf of over 250 betting operators worldwide, providing an unrivalled measure of fan engagement.

Haaland, Mbappe, and Messi all tallied multiple goals, but it was Mbappe who commanded fan attention in the player betting markets.

Reviewing the hundreds of thousands of betting tickets processed by Sportradar in the ‘player to score’ market across France v Senegal, Iraq v Norway, and Argentina v Algeria – Mbappe came out with 29% of them.

On the night, fans favoured Mbappe’s quality in front of goal over Haaland, responsible for 16% of the betting tickets processed in the ‘player to score’ market.Messi accounted for 10%.

Daren Lury, Head of Risk Management at Sportradar said: “We’re seeing high levels of engagement with Mbappe across all of our player markets – a clear sign of his quality and popularity amongst fans worldwide. Based on the betting activity we’re seeing, he’s well positioned to challenge for the Golden Boot having won the award four years ago.”

At time of writing, results from the tournament’s opening matches did little to change engagement with the Golden Boot winner betting market. Erling Haaland accounts for 21% of the betting tickets processed, followed by Kylian Mbappe with 15% and Lionel Messi at 4%.