Benzema is Christian

When Cristiano left An average of 50 goals per season, 450 in 438 games played for Madrid, and the feeling that the life without him after the entity won four Champions in five years, it would be very complicated. He also left a hundred million in cash, paid by Juventus, a small figure, in principle, for the player who had systematically disputed the Ballon d'Or with Messi in the last decade. In the offices of the Santiago Bernabéu they began to develop a strategy to lessen the impact of their departure …

This hard situation the summer 2018. In the market there was no player at the height of the Portuguese star for whom it was worth making a large outlay. By then, the roadmap for the operation Mbappe, which cannot be unleashed until the summer of 2021, when PSG only has one year left on his contract. Neymar It was not an option after passing through Barcelona. Take out Salah Liverpool seemed impossible. AND Kane It cost more than 200 million and its adaptation to the Spanish championship was unknown … It was then that the following reasoning was made from the top of Madrid: “They are Benzema, Asensio and Bale (later the Welshman was replaced by Hazard), who must share Cristiano's 50 goals per season.” To date, and by far, he has only responded Benzema, mysteriously converted from cat to panther at the end of his career, after 30 years (he is now 32).

The statesman Pedro Martín provides a very illuminating fact on Twitter. “Benzema is more important to him second Zidane's Madrid than Cristiano was for him first Madrid of the technician “. Cristiano marked the 28% of the goals of first Madrid of the French (112 of 393), while Benzema has made the 29% of the goals of second Madrid of the award-winning coach (44 of 148).

Completing the statistics (see the attached table), the quantitative leap what has given Benzema in the scorer facet since Cristiano left Madrid. Now, Karim is almost at the 30% on average.

If the goalscorer that Cristiano had been replaced by Benzema With similar records, we must look in another direction for the reason for the sharp drop in the goals scored by the team since the Portuguese was absent (2.8 per game, for example, with him in the doublet season, for the 1.7 that are being marked on average in the current year). The reason is very simple. Behind Benzema alone there is emptiness.

Unaccompanied.

Of the members of the new trident devised by Madrid and Zidane after the BBC, that of Asensio and Hazard accompanying Benzema, the Mallorcan and the Belgian have stopped short. Both added 28 goals in 2017-18 (11 and 17 respectively) and 27 goals in 2018-19 (six Asensio, 21 Hazard). They promised. And they would have been the perfect complement, but in the 2019-20 campaign (last one), they stayed in only two goals between the two (those marked by Hazard, Asensio was injured almost the entire exercise), and now they have another two (also both from the Belgian). It's alarming …

Meanwhile, and at 32 years old, the one who follows his is Benzema. It has recently entered the history of Madrid by becoming the foreigner with the most games in the history of the entity (now, 529), surpassing the 527 of Roberto Carlos. And it adds up and goes on because he has a contract until 2022 and the possibility of having one more renewed and ending with 35.