STADE DE FRANCE, SAINT DENIS — It was only a small group of mostly young UEFA guests, but the noise they made echoed around the largely empty Stade de France as Real Madrid took to the pitch for training on Friday: "KARIM! KARIM! KARIM!"
One man bedecked in Liverpool attire in Saint Denis had earlier claimed 200,000 fans of Jurgen Klopp's team would descend on Paris ahead of the game, turning the French capital red. An exaggeration, of course, but there's no doubt that the Premier League club's travelling support will amass in huge, boisterous numbers on Saturday.
There'll be plenty of Madrid fans, too, from the Spanish capital and the arrondissements of Paris. But there's one man above all that the locals want to see.
"KARIM! KARIM! KARIM!"
Will Benzema win the Ballon d'Or?
As he walked from the tunnel to the newly laid pitch of France's national stadium, the chants towards Karim Benzema turned to "BALLON D'OR! BALLON D'OR!". He turned, and gave a thumbs up.
This game could see Benzema win a remarkable fifth Champions League. As his cheerleading group pointed out, it could also cement his claim to for the 2022 Ballon d'Or, completing his transformation from Cristiano Ronaldo's Real Madrid wingman to the undisputed, irrepressible star of the team. He will face perhaps the ultimate test on Saturday against Liverpool and Virgil van Dijk.
"I don't think he'll put himself up against Virgil van Dijk," counters Stewart Robson, the former Arsenal midfielder, now an analyst for ESPN who follows Madrid closely.
"When he receives the ball, very rarely is it as the centre-forward. He'll drift out wide, go deeper, he'll link-up the play, and then when it goes wide, he makes his way into the box but usually not up against the defender. It's the holding midfielder he runs off the back of.
"He finds that space between the midfield and defenders, and that's what he does so well. It's going to need good understanding from Liverpool's centre-backs, to talk to Fabinho, if he's playing, and for Fabinho to talk to the centre-backs as well.
"[Benzema] is difficult to pick up and that's why he's been so successful this season."
Those successes make Benzema the favourite for the Ballon d'Or already. With 44 goals in 45 games, he is enjoying his most ruthless goalscoring season at the age of 34. He was top scorer as Madrid charged to La Liga's title, and he leads the charts in the Champions League with 15.
👑 King Karim!@Benzema is your UCL Player of the Week 👏#UCLPOTW | @PlayStationEU | #UCL pic.twitter.com/ACHIS2DG8l
— UEFA Champions League (@ChampionsLeague) April 7, 2022
One goal in the final would put him outright third in the all-time scoring list in the competition's history, on 87. It would also see him break Ronaldo's record of 10 goals in the knockout phase in a single season. Two goals, and he'll match old teammate Ronaldo's best of 17 goals in a single Champions League tournament. Three goals, and that record is his alone. A hat-trick against Liverpool might sound a stretch, but Benzema has scored four goals in five previous meetings with the Reds, without losing.
Benzema's influence on Madrid goes beyond statistics, though. In the Zinedine Zidane era, during that astonishing Champions League three-peat from 2016 to 2018, Benzema played second fiddle to the virtuoso Ronaldo; now, Madrid dance to his tune.
"He has more personality and leadership now on and off the pitch," Madrid coach Carlo Ancelotti told the media on Friday. "What has not changed is his quality, which is still top, and also his humility."
Club captain Marcelo added: "He has shown that [leadership], though it's not just been this season. His character and presence has helped the team a lot. He doesn't even need to talk for that. He plays great football for us."
Benzema has long been vital to Madrid; now, he is getting the recognition he deserves. So much so, in fact, that maybe he doesn't even need the Champions League to win the Ballon d'Or. Former Madrid and France midfielder Christian Karembeu certainly thinks so.
Asked by The Sporting News if the match in Paris could decide the next winner of the game's top individual prize, Karembeu replied: "No, I don't think so. I think Benzema has already gained the points to lift the trophy.... [although] you never know about the people who decide."
Will Sadio Mane win the Ballon d'Or?
Well, that sounds clear enough. The Ballon d'Or race is over, right?
"Ha! I don't agree with [Karembeu]," says ESPN analyst Frank Leboeuf. "It's going to be between Benzema and Sadio Mane."
Standing on a terrace above the Champs-Elysees, with the Eiffel Tower twinkling in the distance, you'd forgive Leboeuf for declaring his compatriot the clear favourite for an award that will be handed out in October in this very city, at the Theatre du Chatelet.
But that would be unfair.
"Sadio Mane won the Africa Cup of Nations, he won the League Cup, he won the FA Cup. If he wins the Champions League, he deserves to win the Ballon d'Or, with all due respect to my French compatriot," says Leboeuf, the former Chelsea and France defender.
"I don't like the Ballon d'Or. I don't like individual awards, but let's say that if Liverpool win the Champions League, I think Sadio Mane deserves to get it."
🌍 Top African scorers in the knockout stages (UCL era only):
— UEFA Champions League (@ChampionsLeague) May 6, 2022
⚽️1⃣5⃣ Sadio Mané 🇸🇳
⚽️1⃣4⃣ Didier Drogba 🇨🇮
⚽️1⃣1⃣ Mohamed Salah 🇪🇬
⚽️1⃣0⃣ Samuel Eto'o 🇨🇲
⚽️0⃣7⃣ Emmanuel Adebayor 🇹🇬
Your favourite❓#UCL pic.twitter.com/oWhv0HUd2c
Klopp seems to agree.
"Sadio's in the shape of his life, it's a joy to watch him in training and in games," the Liverpool manager said ahead of the final.
"When you think about how these competitions are won, then yes [this game could win him the award]. You are either Ronaldo, Messi or you won the Champions League final. That's how it was in the last few years. It will increase the chance, definitely."
Klopp's right: Since 2007, Messi and Ronaldo have won the Ballon d'Or 12 times between them. There are just five occasions — Messi in 2010, 2012, 2019 and 2021, and Ronaldo in 2013 — when the Ballon d'Or winner did not also win the Champions League
The only other players in that time frame to win the prize are Kaka in 2007, and Luka Modric in 2018. They each won the Champions League in the year of their triumph. Had the 2020 award not been cancelled due to the pandemic, it would almost certainly have gone to Robert Lewandowski, who became a European champion for the first time that August.
Mane started 2022 by winning the Africa Cup of Nations with Senegal, in which he was named player of the tournament. He scored two goals in three starts in England's domestic cups, winning both trophies (we'll let him off a missed penalty in the FA Cup final shootout).
He scored 16 times in 34 Premier League games, including winners over Aston Villa and West Ham and an equaliser against Manchester City, all of which helped the Reds keep their title challenge alive to the final day. He scored then, too, against Wolves at Anfield.
There have been few better big-game performers anywhere in the world this season and that, surely, is a requisite of a Ballon d'Or winner. If Mane wins the Champions League final for Liverpool, can he really be overlooked?
🤩 One more day until the #UCLFinal!
— 𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐒𝐩𝐨𝐫𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐍𝐞𝐰𝐬 UK 🇬🇧 (@sportingnewsuk) May 27, 2022
🏆 Will record-breakers Real Madrid make it 1️⃣4️⃣ or will it be 7️⃣ for Liverpool in Paris? 🤔#LFC | #HalaMadrid pic.twitter.com/m9LdtOh2Td
Who will win the Champions League final?
Maybe it's trite to focus too much pre-game energy on the Ballon d'Or. There's a much bigger trophy — literally and figuratively — up for grabs here. The Champions League final will almost certainly come down to more than just the performances of two players; conversely, in fact, individual star turns may not be necessary.
"A final is different," says Leboeuf, a World Cup winner at the Stade de France in 1998. "A football game is full of details. I've played maybe nine, 10 finals in my career, and you don't play well. You don't think about playing well. You just win it, or you lose it."
So, who's winning?
"If I knew everything about football, every result, I would be a billionaire! But it's impossible to think what would happen. After two minutes you can have someone injured, you can have a red card, you can have someone like Vinicius Jr. take on Trent Alexander-Arnold and then Alexander-Arnold is under pressure for 88 minutes.
"Let's say that, for me, Liverpool have the advantage because of the quality they have and what they showed during the season, but saying it's done would be completely stupid."
One big opportunity remains ✊🔴 #UCLfinal pic.twitter.com/q8AiCvk8l8
— Liverpool FC (@LFC) May 27, 2022
Karembeu agrees: "Of course, I think that, year by year, you can see Liverpool have increased their potential.
"They also won the title against Tottenham [in 2019]. I think they are very, very dangerous and they have experience. This is the main point: they have experience to win another title."
And yet, if experience is what matters, Madrid have it in bucketloads. The squad is replete with Champions League winners; in Carlo Ancelotti, they have a man who could become the first coach to lift the trophy four times.
There's just something about them in this competition. This season, their first home game ended in defeat to Moldova's Sheriff Tiraspol. Against Paris Saint-Germain in the last 16, they looked doomed until Benzema's 17-minute hat-trick. Then, they let Chelsea have a comeback of their own only to snatch victory from their grasp, and in the semifinal against Manchester City, they were behind in the tie from the second to the 181st minute. And yet, here they stand.
Which brings us back to Benzema — the man who dragged them through each of those contests, who will take to the field in his home country's capital, the Ballon d'Or firmly in his sights for the first time in an 18-year senior career in which he's sometimes had to fight for real recognition.
"At some point, you're going to lose one battle," says Leboeuf. "The most important thing is to win the war."
Frank Leboeuf was speaking to The Sporting News courtesy of daily soccer talk show ESPN FC.
