Should we sell Benzema?

After reading that Benzema is not favoured in yet another poll (info from another thread), had me thinking: the day Benzema leaves or gets chased out the club, would Madrid fans consider him a legend or an icon of sorts?

Currently, Benzema has 115 goals in 225 apps for Madrid (according to Wiki). Is it possible that even with such an amount of goals and appearances that Madrid fans would just be like "meh, he was alright I guess" or would he be considered in the same mold as Santillana, Butragueno, Kopa, essentially the 2nd tier of Madrid legends.

People will appreciate his record no doubt but I don't think anyone will rate his time for us highly when he leaves. It'd probably be similar to when Beckham left. Famous player who wore the white shirt, we thank him for his services and that's that. No way he will be in the 2nd tier. He'd probably just scrape the 3rd imo

I do think it's time to move on from him though. We have Morata and more than a capable back up in Mariano Lucas has shown how you can't underestimate players with little experience especially when they are from the academy. We have so many players from our Cantera who should be playing for the first team but aren't because we have too many overpriced players on our roster. Perez can stuff his BBC where the sun don't shine

Source for the poll: http://en.as.com/en/2016/12/02/football/1480675121_402421.html

He is top ten all time goals scored, and he still has time to produce. The term legend is thrown around quite a bit though, there are a lot of names ahead of him when it comes to status. He is a great player and I don't want to discredit anything he has done at RM, but there is a long line of players competing for legend status.

Lots of fans don't even consider Cristiano a legend for RM, so that tells you all you need to know right there.

Benz has never really won over the Spanish fans so to answer your question, it will be thanks for your services. But, with the way people call anyone who ever played a legend, I suppose he might get listed, but it will be a lower tier if there is such a thing.

The issue this year though is fans have seen him show up out of shape and injured after he had the entire summer free to get himself ready and when he has played it has been with no energy and almost invisible most games, compared to Morata who is always playing with energy and excitement and now after the Copa game same thing from Mariano. These guys are reserves at best and yet the starter looks like he doesn't give a dam. That in a nutshell is his problem and the only way he will turn that around is by putting effort into his game and getting concrete results. Otherwise expect the jeering to continue and increase. I don't believe this is an issue with Zidane nor Perez, but the fans do have a say and they are voicing it rather loudly.

Expect severe jeering of Benz next Wednesday (home against Dortmund) if Zidane is dumb enough to start him again. And I plan on being there to lead this jeering!

Oh yea, I already expect him to be booed without mercy. The lads and lasses at the Bernabeu would not be letting this performance slide at all.

It would literally have to be the work of God to convince the Bernabeu to show mercy.

Who would play instead of Benzema? Mariano?

imo if you want to sell a player, certain boxes have to be ticked. first of all, the coach should approve the move; as he may have use for such player on his squad

secondly, you should have a viable replacement for such player. and by viable replacement, i don't mean based on performances in one, two, three or four games. i mean, over the course of the season, does that player have the ability to give you numbers? how does that player play when he's off form? what is the injury record like?

say what you want about benzema, i think he can score at least 20 in la liga this season. i'm not sure the names we are mentioning can do that next season, unless ofcourse we look for a replacement outside our club

the goal ratio is very important because, cristiano will be a year older next season, who ever is playing cf must be able to score goals. bale will probably get yet another injury again, to lay him off for certain periods, so the cf must really be ready

i think sportsczy said we should wait till january for the verdict (if i can call it that). i say we wait till the end of the season, and see the goal returns as well as performances. the season is still very long, but "performances" like that showing at the nou camp, and some of the other poor showings need to end asap

No need to tick any boxes lol.

Sell him for anything. I don't know any other player who had a free ride like this.

Not just him. Ronaldo too. I have had it with both of them.

It's one thing you don't press or defend because you're physically incapable of it. It's another thing when you're just being plain lazy and couldn't care less about the club. They both fall under the second category.

They both played very well work-rate-wise against Napoli. Then went back to their lazy self after that, which means they're intentionally being lazy, and that's unacceptable.

Their laziness is greatly holding us back. If they played like they did against Napoli all the time, we would win most of our games with relative ease.

Aside from affecting our performance, they're also preventing other players from getting more playing time. This, coupled with a manager who picks his starting eleven based on names and nationality rather than merit, and you got yourself a real problem on your hand.

If the board doesn't intervene, most of our talented youngsters will leave in the summer, and we'd end up with a weak bench and the laziest forward line in Europe.

Meanwhile in Turin a certain Argentinian is scoring left and right

where's chad? somebody get him on the phone and get him online so we can make some sense of all this

watching benzema is like watching raul in his last season at real madrid.

Frustrating

the only difference is raul tried, he was slow, had zero pace, lost stamina. but he tried.

Benzema is done, mentally. he looks physically week as well.

France doesnt want him, he look terrible for his club. he is done.

Riiiiiight!!! That's why this annoying feeling is familiar. This is basically like Raul's last (2) seasons at Madrid without the endearing past that Raul has had at the club.

The main difference is that Raul wasn't starting in his final season and we had other options (Benzema, Higuain). Watching Benzema struggle match after match as the lone starter is a level of depressing that Raul's lowest lows wouldn't fathom.

https://www.lequipe.fr/Football/Actualites/Karim-djaziri-n-est-plus-l-agent-de-karim-benzema/947349

Benzema just fired his only and longtime agent Karim Djaziri.

Signed with Best of You agency, who represents Casemiro and Odriozola on Madrid.

I think he's leaving for sure. You don't change your agent unless something is afoot.

Could be a lot of reasons tbh. Personal differences, could think this new agency could get him a better contract, maybe Djaziri wants him to leave and Benz wants to stay. Who knows at this point. If he were to leave, I would doubt it would happen in the winter transfer window. But I suppose if Lope is really really unhappy with Benz (understandably) it could happen- only if a non-cup-tied Striker could come in. Lots of ‘ifs.’ If he does leave I think it will be in summer with Modric.

A new agency doesn't take you on unless there's a transaction coming... they are paid entirely as a percentage of a transaction. Benz just extended his contract in Sept 2017; so there's no new contract negotiations coming (especially given his age). To me, it's highly likely that there's a transfer coming.

Sure but it will no doubt be next summer. You don't do a winter transfer unless there is an incoming CL eligible striker!!!!

and next summer will satisfy all of us!!!

Yeah I mean it'a great sign. That's my point. Hopefully Bale changes his agent too lol.

lol, next summer comes and flo signs a 14 year old for 50 million and we promote some castilla boys and he gives us the "we're sticking with our identity speech"....and ofcourse bale and benzema starting as untouchables. i don't get my hopes us with signings at madrid these days. as i've always said, we love to make things unnecessarily interesting. a lot of things we've done defies logic and reasoning

We're a bit *bleep* in terms of strikers btw. Benz is out with a muscle tear in his hamstring. No news on Bale.

running out of bodies lol.

sportsczy wrote:We're a bit *bleep* in terms of strikers btw. Benz is out with a muscle tear in his hamstring. No news on Bale.

running out of bodies lol.

Bale is injured, as well.

Bale is injured yet called up and assumingly playing for Wales this Thursday!

How is that possible?

Real Madrid coach Julen Lopetegui confirmed Gareth Bale and Karim Benzema suffered injuries in the LaLiga giants' shock 1-0 loss to Deportivo Alaves.

It could just be a minor one in Bale's case, but yeah, I don't know why we'd risk letting him travel to Wales so soon after getting an injury, let alone risk him aggravating the injury while representing his country.

vanDEEZ wrote:Who would play instead of Benzema? Mariano?

2 years later and this is coming to fruition