With an average goal per match, Karim Benzema is having the best season of his career (2021-2022). The departure from Real Madrid of Cristiano Ronaldo in 2018 and his break with the Blues did a lot of good for the native of Lyon who, at 34, asserts himself as the best player in the world this season.
The best for career ending. This sentence perfectly suits Karim Benzema, who has continued to improve over the past four seasons, to assert himself today as the best player in the world.
The departure of CR7
Cristiano Ronaldo’s departure from Real Madrid in 2018 is certainly not insignificant in Benzema’s rise since. The Lyonnais has indeed taken the light since and shines even more thanks to his contributions at the tactical and technical levels. During the nine seasons (from 2009 to 2018) that Karim Benzema shared Real Madrid’s attack with Cristiano Ronaldo, he played 412 matches, scoring 192 goals and providing 113 assists. In the four seasons that followed (2018-2022), and without Cristiano Ronaldo, the former Olympique Lyonnais player played 190 matches, scoring 130 goals and delivering 45 assists. Thus, in the Ronaldo era, Benzema averaged 0.46 goals per game and was decisive offensively (goals + assists) 0.74 times per game. Since the departure of the native of Madeira, Benzema has shot 0.68 goals per game, an increase of almost 50%. As for his offensive efficiency, the Blues striker is decisive 0.92 times per game, an increase of 35%, compared to the period when he shared the attack of “Merengue” with Cristiano Ronaldo.
The return to the French team
Marked by ups and downs, his career in the France team can also explain his thunderous end to his career. In 2016, Benzema was removed from the France team following the affair of the sextape and relationship problems with Didier Deschamps. Five seasons will follow where the Real Madrid player will not be called up to the France team. These rest periods in the windows dedicated to international matches have undoubtedly allowed him to better manage his seasons physically and to have better performances, before successfully returning to blue in 2021, with a successful Euro (4 goals in 4 matches) who has regenerated him mentally, as evidenced by his brilliant current season with the club.
At 34, in better shape than Pelé, Maradona and Zidane
The Lyon native’s stats this season are the best of his entire career. If we compare these figures this season with those of the best players in history the year of their 34 years, Benzema can be compared to a good wine which does not stop improving with time. Indeed, Pelé retired at the age of 32 and Maradona certainly played the World Cup in 1994 at the age of 34, but he had shown himself as much on the field as by his setbacks linked to doping. As for Zinédine Zidane, the year of his 34 years, the 2005-2006 season was the last of his career. He was very irregular, scoring only 9 goals and delivering only 11 assists in 38 matches, before nevertheless succeeding in his 2006 World Cup, despite the header to Materazzi in the final. But these players played in times when the physical preparation was not as good as today, and the comparison with today’s giants such as Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo seems more relevant.
Above Messi and CR7 at 34
Like Benzema, Lionel Messi was born in 1987. This season, Messi has shown some decline registering only 9 goals, 13 assists in 32 matches, or 0.28 goals per game. Benzema meanwhile averaged one goal per game in all competitions (43 goals in 43 matches). As for Cristiano Ronaldo, the year he turned 34 during the 2018-2019 season, while playing at Juventus, he scored 28 goals in 43 matches, or 0.65 goals per game. The two football giants of the last decade and a half therefore have a worse passing time than KB9 in the year of his 34 years.
On the way to a fifth Champions League
On a collective level, Karim Benzema will play with Real Madrid against Liverpool on May 28, the Champions League final. If Real Madrid win, Benzema would win his fifth Champions League, as many as Ronaldo and one more than Messi. This would be a particularly brilliant achievement at his age. Indeed, Ronaldo was 33 when he last led Real to the continental title in 2018; Messi was 28 when he won his last Champions League with Barça in 2015 and Zidane was 30 when he won his 2002 crown with Real.
But more than a fifth Champions League, it is Benzema’s performance in Qatar, during the next World Cup in November, which could propel him to the status of one of the best French players of all time. A victory in Qatar with good performances could definitely put him in the court of Platini, Zidane and Mbappé, who have all won at least one major international title with the Blues.
