MADRID, 5 Apr. (SportsFinding) –
Real Madrid’s French striker, Karim Benzema, insisted once again that he likes to play with his compatriot Kylian Mbappé and that with him in the Madrid team they would score “double or triple goals”, while also making it clear that he has not taught Vinicius Junior to “play football” but to improve decision-making.
“I like playing with him for the national team and I would like to play with him for Real Madrid. I think we would score twice as many goals. Or maybe even triple!” Benzema said with a laugh in an interview with the newspaper ‘L’. Equipe’ that is published this Tuesday.
The one from Lyon, who says “often” that his compatriot could be a good complement for the Madrid attack that he and Vinicius Junior form, stressed that he understands “well” with the current Paris Saint-Germain player because they know “what the other will do.”
“For example, we both like to go to the left, but we will never be both at the same time and one will go in or look for it in depth,” added the international who does not hide that having good rapport with his attacking partners is “what main” for him. “I accurately analyze each player’s game to know where he will go in different situations,” he considered.
Benzema also praises other compatriots such as the FC Barcelona player Ousmane Dembélé, whom he likes “a lot”. “He unbalances, he knows how to play on touch and puts magnificent crosses,” he said of the winger, while Antoine Griezmann warns that he is “a world ‘top’ player” with “immense qualities”.
“I didn’t teach Vinicius to play football. All I did with him was make him change his mind because before he had an idea to overwhelm and then it was like ‘we’ll see what I do’. Today he overflows knowing if he will score, cross, penetrate… Everyone this year says ‘Vinicius this, Vinicius that’, but he is the same player as last season. The only difference is that now he makes the right decisions. He thinks and this is what I taught him”, he remarked on the Brazilian winger for Real Madrid.
On the ‘Ballon d’Or’, the man from Lyon does not hide that “it is a goal”. “Especially because I think that last year I wasn’t very far away, but I hadn’t won a trophy with my club. It’s a motivation, but not only personal, I include the team, because if I manage to take them to win trophies, there will inevitably be individual rewards.” , be sincere.
DOES NOT SEE CITY, LIVERPOOL AND BAYERN AS FAVORITES
As for the Champions League, Benzema warns that “there is no favourite” in the tie against English side Chelsea. “Against PSG we were perhaps favorites in the first leg, and in the second leg PSG had become ultra-favourites, so that doesn’t mean anything. Chelsea are a very good team, but we will go to London to look for a good result.” , he pointed.
In addition, he does not agree that the favorites are Manchester City, Liverpool or Bayern. “I don’t see it that way at all. I watch the games and at City, their aim is to keep the ball and make a long possession in the opposite half, but they haven’t yet come up against a team that attack them well from behind. Liverpool is the same, it’s very good, but especially at home, and Bayern is a team that scores goals but also concedes a lot. The team that scared me the most was PSG”, said the ‘9’.
Finally, the Frenchman hopes to end his career being “proud” of what he has done. “My main objective was to try to become a kind of ‘ideal’ striker. I admired Ronaldo Nazario because he revolutionized the position when I was little and then nobody can do what he did, it’s impossible. Nobody comes close to him and every time we say that this player remembers Ronaldo is an invention. If I have revolutionized the forward position in my own way, that is my greatest achievement,” he said.