Images of his arrival were captured by El Chiringuito and have since ignited one of the most controversial weeks of his time at the club.
Mbappé, 27, had been on a short break in Cagliari, Sardinia, with Spanish actress Ester Expósito, with whom he has been pictured publicly on a number of occasions since March. The trip had already attracted attention before Sunday, with footage of the pair at a restaurant in the Sardinian capital circulating across social media from Friday. The timing was the problem.
Mbappé had been ruled out of the Espanyol match with a semitendinous muscle injury in his left leg, sustained in the 80th minute of the 1-1 draw against Real Betis, and has been absent from Valdebebas while his recovery is managed by the club's medical department.
In isolation, a short break during an injury layoff is not unusual. In context, it has caused fury among sections of the Madrid support and unease inside the club itself. Real Madrid are 11 points behind Barcelona with four games remaining.
They are already without a major trophy for the second consecutive season, having been eliminated by Bayern Munich in the Champions League quarter-finals. The images of their highest-paid player dining relaxed in Italy while his teammates prepared for a fixture they needed to win landed badly.
Social media response among the Madrid fanbase was severe. Comments ranged from questioning the severity of the injury — with some supporters suggesting the trip implied he was not as incapacitated as the club bulletin had indicated — to broader accusations of a lack of commitment to the club's cause at the most demanding moment of a difficult campaign.
According to Le Parisien, Mbappé's focus has already partly shifted toward the World Cup in North America this summer, with France expecting their captain to arrive fully fit and ready to lead a serious challenge. That context does not make his absence from Espanyol any less damaging in the eyes of a support base that expected more from the forward who was billed as the player who would take the club back to the summit of European football.
He has scored 41 goals across all competitions this season — the highest total of his career — and is competing with Kosovo international Vedat Muriqi for the Pichichi, the Spanish top scorer award. Whether he features in the Clásico at the Camp Nou on 10 May remains uncertain after Arbeloa said his progress would be assessed throughout the week following last week's medical tests that had suggested a longer recovery than initially hoped.
The controversy has added fresh fuel to the debate about Mbappé's connection to the values the club demands. He arrived at Real Madrid in July 2024 on a free transfer from Paris Saint-Germain, making him the most expensive free signing in the club's history once bonuses and image rights were included. Sunday's images will not be forgotten quickly.