Karim Benzema won the 2022 Ballon d’Or (the Golden Ball 2022) convincingly. So what is the reason for this?
His 2021/22 season is extremely impressive
In the 2021-22 season, it is clear that Karim Benzema has had a super convincing performance. Indeed, the French striker won the UEFA Nations League with his national team last October. Before he won the Spanish Super Cup, won La Liga and the UEFA Champions League.
At these tournaments, Benzema has played a central role in the squad and has the best scoring form of his career. As a former England player, Owen Hargreaves was excited on BT Sport following Benzema’s performance against Eintracht Frankfurt in the UEFA Super Cup in August.
“When you think about the history of Real Madrid, Zidane with his brilliant goal against Leverkusen, Benzema has created the same miracle. Whenever Real needed him, he created a big moment.”
Across all Real Madrid’s competitions in the 2021-22 season, Benzema has scored 44 goals and 15 assists in 46 appearances and contributed an average of one goal every 66.42 minutes.
If that wasn’t enough, consider the fact that the 34-year-old has given a goal or an assist in 32 of the 46 games he has played throughout the season.
Even more amazing is the fact that he has contributed to more goals than other players such as Robert Lewandowski (57 goals), Mohamed Salah (47 goals), Erling Haaland (37 goals) and Ciro Immobile (36 goals).
That means he contributed to 48.7% of Real Madrid’s goals in the 2021/22 season. Benzema is the league’s top scorer, while Barcelona’s Ousmane Dembele trails him in assists.
Special stats – Benzema’s records
Benzema has scored 10 goals in the knockout stages of the Champions League for the 2021-22 season. Why is it special? He currently tops the most goals scored in a season alongside his former teammate, Cristiano Ronaldo (season 2016-17).
We should also mention that Benzema is the second player to score a hat-trick in a row in the knockout stages of the Champions League. Ronaldo did it against Bayern Munich and Atletico Madrid in 2017.
Last but not least, the former Lyon striker is the fourth player to win both the Pichichi title – the La Liga award for top scorer – as well as the UEFA Champions League Golden Shoe in the same season.
- The second player besides Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo to win the Ballon d’Or in the past 15 years, after Luka Modric in 2018.
- The fifth French player in history to win the Ballon d’Or after Raymond Kopa, Jean-Pierre Papin, Michel Platini and Zinedine Zidane.
- Oldest player (34 years and 10 months) to win the Ballon d’Or since Sir Stanley Matthews (41 years and 10 months) in 1956.
- France became the country with the most Ballon d’Or (7 titles) along with Germany, the Netherlands, Portugal and Argentina. France and Germany are the two countries with the most representatives (5 players).
- Real Madrid owns a total of 12 Golden Balls, only 1 behind Barcelona. In terms of the number of players receiving the Ballon d’Or, Los Blancos (8 people) completely outperformed their great rival (6 people).
The girlfriend of the owner of the Golden Ball 2022 used to work as a waitress
Jordan Ozuna, 32 years old, girlfriend of Karim Benzema, now a model, she used to work as a waitress at Las Vegas Hooters.
