How good is Karim Benzema?
When the French forward is at his best – as he was during the first half of this season – he is clearly world class, capable of classily unlocking any defence with his cool creativity and glorious first touch.
But throughout his 11 seasons with Real Madrid, Benzema has regularly endured lengthy spells which see him fall well below those standards as he becomes a marginal figure in the action, seemingly unable to impose himself.
However, despite those runs of poor form – one of which is being witnessed right now – Benzema is clearly one of the greatest forwards in the proud history of Real Madrid. The question is: how high up the list does he deserve to be?
Let’s take a look…
5. Karim Benzema (501 appearances, 241 goals)
Karim Benzema has been the first choice striker throughout almost the entirety of the last decade, barring a brief period under Jose Mourinho when he was used in rotation with, and occasionally alongside, Gonzalo Higuain.
In many ways, Benzema has lived through a strange era at the Bernabeu. On the European front, he has enjoyed great success, playing a fundamental role in four Champions League triumphs. Domestically, though, Benzema and his teammates have been dominated by Barcelona, with Real winning just two league titles (so far) during his time at the club.
Benzema’s goal tally is more than respectable, and it should also be noted that for much of his spell he was forced to play a secondary role in support of Cristiano Ronaldo, showing commendable unselfishness to let the Portuguese star grab the limelight while he settled for slick approach work and creation of space.
As Real’s 6th highest scorer (and he will overtake Ferenc Puskas soon) and the joint-fourth leading scorer in the Champions League, Benzema deserves to be recognised in this list and he edges out Emilio Butragueno (who had more league titles but never became a European champion) and Santillana (who had longevity but only a couple of truly prolific seasons) into fifth place.
4. Ferenc Puskas (262 appearances, 242 goals)
Known as ‘The Galloping Major’, Ferenc Puskas is probably best remembered for his magic with the Hungarian national team than his contributions at club level. But he also put together a sensational record for Real Madrid, scoring nearly a goal a game during his eight years with the club.
When Puskas arrived in Spain in 1958, he was already 31 years old and past his very best, which had seen him dazzle for top Hungarian side Honved as well as inspiring his national team to a series of dazzling achievements – mostly famously shocking England with an iconic 6-3 win at Wembley in 1953.
But he had always relied on flawless technique rather than stamina, and any concerns that Puskas was too old to excel for Real were soon dismissed when he scored four hat-tricks in his first season with the club. His first two seasons resulted in European Cup triumphs, and he also won five consecutive La Liga titles between 1961 and 1965, four of which saw him finish as the league’s leading scorer. And if he had joined the club a few years earlier, he would be even higher in this list.
3. Raul (741 appearances, 323 goals)
As far as many fans were concerned, around the turn of the century Raul was Real Madrid. Along with fellow youth graduate goalkeeper Iker Casillas, Raul provided a Spanish spine to a multicultural team during the early days of the ‘Galacticos’ project and was regarded by millions of Real fans as one of their own.
David Beckham, Zinedine Zidane, Luis Figo, Roberto Carlos…the big-name superstars came and went but Raul outlasted them all. And he didn’t survive for so long as a token nod to the locals; he thoroughly earned his place in the starting line-up throughout his 15 years in the first team, standing shoulder to shoulder with the imported megastars as he won three Champions League titles and six La Liga crowns.
More than just the trophies, though, Raul was so deeply loved because of his captivating grace and style. Even many Barcelona fans struggle to find a bad word about a player who transcended the lavish spending at his side with his effortless elegance. The fact he was from Madrid and also starred for the Spanish national team added further shine to his unblemished reputation, and he remains the most-loved player of the modern Real Madrid era.
2. Cristiano Ronaldo (438 appearances, 450 goals)
The figures speak for themselves. An average of more than a goal per game over the course of nine seasons is a ludicrous level of consistency which has only been attained by a handful of players in the history of football, more than justifying the world record fee of £80 million which lured him to the Bernabeu from Manchester United in the summer of 2009.
More than a few eyebrows were raised by the size of that fee, but it didn’t take long for Ronaldo to show Madridistas that he was worth it. His brutal combination of dazzling technical brilliance, physical power and furious focus made him an unstoppable force of nature, and he scored more than 50 goals in six of his nine seasons in Spain.
Ronaldo’s matchless self-confidence was particularly important for Real Madrid fans whose collective ego was being threatened by Barcelona’s era-defining football, and he undoubtedly helped Los Blancos retain their sense of self-esteem at a challenging period in the club’s history. That obsessive cockiness didn’t always make Cristiano popular, but it did make him great. Not quite, however, the greatest…
1. Alfredo Di Stefano (396 appearances, 308 goals)
It would have to take something special to eclipse Cristiano Ronaldo on any kind of list, and Alfredo Di Stefano was very special indeed.
Born in Argentina, Di Stefano arrived in Madrid via Colombia and Barcelona in a complex transfer which nearly led to him joining Real’s bitter rivals from Catalonia before unknown forces – political pressure was suspected – saw him end up in the Spanish capital.
He was 27 years old, at his absolute peak, and marked his debut by scoring a hat-trick in a 5-0 thrashing of…guess who?…Barcelona. That set the tone for everything that followed, as Di Stefano played himself into the history books by – among many other achievements – scoring in each of the first five European Cup finals, all of which were won by Real.
The greatest exposition of his talent came into the 1960 final against Eintracht Frankfurt, where Di Stefano (with the considerable assistance of Puskas) enraptured a crowd of more than 120,000 at Hampden Park in Glasgow by scoring a hat-trick and nonchalantly displaying other-worldly football, with his flawless first touch, flamboyant dribbling (he was doing double-stepovers half a century before Ronaldo) and deadly finishing making him the complete package.
Di Stefano did more than anyone else to turn Real Madrid into the kings of Europe, and his legacy lives on. He was named the club’s honorary president in 2000, and six years later a new arena was opened for the Real reserve team: the Estadio Alfredo Di Stefano. He will never be forgotten, and he will never be surpassed.
