17 fun facts about Karim Benzema

During Real Madrid's record-breaking 2011-12 season, in which they won the league by bagging 100 points and scoring 121 goals, Benzema was responsible for another record.

The-then 23-year-old scored the opening goal just 21 seconds after kick-off, which became the fastest goal ever scored in an El Clásico, a record that still stands today.

We really are missing @Benzema at this tournament!! 🙁🇫🇷

Who remembers this goal he scored in El Clásico after just 20 seconds back in 2011? 😲#LaLigaTV pic.twitter.com/VrI3D3lOCq

— LaLigaTV (@LaLigaTV) December 6, 2022

Benzema was born to Hafid Benzema and Wahida Djebbara, who were French nationals of Algerian descent. Given his Algerian roots, the Algerian Football Federation tried to convince Benzema to represent the Algerian national team, but his heart leaned towards representing Les Bleus.

"It's my parents' country, it's in my heart," the Frenchman stated in an interview with RMC in 2006.

"But well, from a sporting perspective, it's true I'll play in the French team. I'll always be available for the French team.

"It's more for the sporting side, because Algeria is my country, you see, my parents come from there. France, on the other hand ... it's more of a sport thing, that's it."

When he was just eight years old, Benzema began playing football for his local club, Bron Terraillon. When he scored twice against the Lyon Youth Academy in a U-10 match, he began drawing the attention of Lyon club officials.

Officials from Lyon personally visited him and convinced Bron Terraillon to sell him. Serge Santa Cruz, the club's then-president, declined to sell him. The agreement was finalized after Lyon's representatives spoke with Benzema's parents. And that was the time when Benzema worked as a ballboy for Lyon's senior squad matches.

Benzema had to communicate with the first-team players at Lyon who were already well-established when he was promoted to the first team. The first squad players that Lyon had at the time included Florent Malouda, Sylvian Wiltord, Eric Abidal, and Michael Essien, among others.

Benzema was subjected to jokes when he first encountered these players, which he didn't find to be very amusing.

He then declared, "Do not laugh, I'm here to take your place."

And he kept his word.

Benzema went on to make 148 appearances for Les Gones, scoring 66 goals, and helped Lyon continue their dominance in France at the time.

Benzema made his debut for Lyon's first team on January 15, 2005, in a Ligue 1 game against Metz. The-then 17-year-old came on in the 77th minute for Pierre-Alain Frau, with the deadlock yet to be broken.

After Juninho opened the scoring in the 84th minute, Benzema teed up Bryan Bergougnoux, who made it 2-0 in the 86th minute.

Coincidentally, both Bergougnoux and Benzema came off the bench at the same time.

On November 9, 2006, Raymond Domenech gave Benzema his first call-up to the senior national team ahead of the team's upcoming friendly encounter against Greece, which was to be played on 15th November. However, an injury while playing for Lyon forced him to withdraw from the squad.

He had to wait for over four months to make his debut for France, which came against Austria during their UEFA Euro 2008 qualifying campaign.

Benzema started the match as a substitute. At half-time, the forward was brought on for Djibril Cissé and went on to score the only goal of the game, coming from a Samir Nasri free-kick.

The third youngest child, Benzema grew up in the eastern Lyon suburb of Bron with eight other siblings. Gressy and Sabri, his younger siblings, were both football players.

While Gressy was forced to leave football due to injuries in 2012, it has been reported that Sabri had a similar playing style to Karim and could have made a name for himself had he made the leap from semi-professional football instead of quitting.

Upon his return to Real Madrid as the sporting director ahead of the 2011-12 season, Zidane and Laurent Blanc advised Benzema to lose weight.

He travelled to Merano, Italy, to a high-performance clinic where he received weight-loss therapy. The clinic stint was eventually successful because the striker was eight kilograms lighter when he reported for preseason.

Benzema exercised physically to increase his muscle bulk while he was at the clinic. In the preseason, the striker was impressive, netting eight goals in seven games.

Because of his preseason exploits, José Mourinho selected him as the team's lead striker. Later, Mourinho was given credit for Benzema's transformation, but he declined to take complete ownership and instead credited the striker.

"Karim now views football the way I view football," the Portuguese manager stated ahead of the start of the season.

Following his exploits in the 2021-22 season, where he won the Pichichi Trophy and was the highest goalscorer in the UEFA Champions League, in addition to winning both the league and the UCL, Benzema was awarded the 2022 Ballon d'Or award on 17th October, 2022. That made him the first Frenchman since Zidane (1998) to win this individual accolade.

In doing so, he became the oldest player since Stanley Matthews to win the Ballon d'Or. Matthews won the award at the first-ever Ballon d'Or ceremony in 1956, aged 41 years and 10 months. When Benzema won the award, he was 34 years and 302 days old.

When Real Madrid visited Stamford Bridge on 6 April 2022 to take on Chelsea in the first leg of the UEFA Champions League quarter-finals, Benzema netted a hat-trick to become the oldest player to score a treble in Europe's most prestigious club competition, aged 34 years and 108 days.

Benzema is already the second-highest goalscorer in Real Madrid history, with 342 goals to his name in 634 appearances.

However, according to Transfermarkt, he has 164 assists too, which are more than any other player in the club's history.

Coincidentally, while Ronaldo is the record goalscorer with 450 goals in 438 games, he is behind Benzema in the assists list with 130.

With 634 appearances, Benzema is Real Madrid's record appearance-maker as a foreigner. He is followed by Marcelo and Roberto Carlos, who made 546 and 527 appearances, respectively.

Benzema is one of the greatest, if not the greatest, French players to ever step on a football pitch.

However, by the time he hangs up his boots, he will be remembered as the greatest French goalscorer of all-time, ahead of Thierry Henry.

The 35-year-old has scored 445 goals at senior level in 879 appearances, with 66 of those goals coming for Lyon, 342 for Real Madrid, and 37 for the France national team.

Benzema holds the Guinness World Record for scoring in 18 consecutive seasons in the UEFA Champions League, starting from the 2005-06 season. Lionel Messi is the other player who he shares the record with.

Before Benzema joined Real Madrid, he was donning #10 on his back at Lyon. When he joined Los Blancos in 2009, he was handed #11 since Ronaldo was playing with #9.

However, when club legend Raúl departed the club next summer, Cristiano chose his preferred #7, after which Benzema got #9. The French forward has been Real Madrid's #9, both figuratively and literally, ever since.

During a La Liga game against Real Betis on January 13, 2019, Benzema was on the receiving end of a collision with Betis defender Marc Bartra.

The incident resulted in Benzema fracturing the little finger on his right hand and was advised to undergo surgery. However, he was also told that there would be a recovery period of two months.

Given Real Madrid's problems during the 2018-19 season, Benzema decided against undergoing surgery in order to continue playing.

The Frenchman did have an operation following the end of the 2018-19, but he didn't complete his rehabilitation, which prevented his finger from completely healing.

"I did have an operation, but when you have surgery you have to be out for two months," he said in a press conference in October 2021.

"I've hurt [the finger] again, but I don’t have time to stop and have another operation, so I wear the bandage when I'm playing."

Benzema plays with the bandage on even to this day, and many believe that it works a good luck charm.

In 2017, a movie titled 'Le K Benzema', directed by Florent Bodin and Damien Piscarel, was released which shed light on Karim's journey from being a young boy in the streets of Lyon to being axed from the France squad in 2016.