The Fußball Chatter

When the Ballon D'or comes around every year, football discourse goes into overdrive, whether this player should be higher on the twenty-five shortlist or why many defenders or midfielders are higher up the list. It's like debating who's the best rapper alive or who has the better chicken between Popeye's or KFC. France Football sure knows what they are doing. Anyways, the ceremony in Paris happened last night with some notable highlights. Gavi won the Kopa Trophy, the award for the best player under the age of 21. Ahead of the likes of Eduardo Camavinga, Jamal Musiala and Jude Bellingham. Barcelona's Alexia Putellas retained the Ballon D'or Feminin over Sam Kerr and Beth Head. Robert Lewandowski won the Gerd Muller trophy (Best Striker Award), which he won last year. Sadio Mane was awarded the Socrates award for his charity work in Senegal. However, the leading moment was Karim Benzema, who dressed in a suit replicated by one of his idols Tupac being awarded th...

A brace from Karim Benzema gave Real Madrid a 2-1 win at the Estadio Alfredo Di Stefano on Thursday evening. That win, as well as Barcelona losing to Osasuna, was enough for Real Madrid to win La Liga before the final weekend of the season. This is Madrid's first league title since 2017, their 34th league title and their first major trophy since the departure of Cristiano Ronaldo. Following their campaign last season where they hired three managers and had a steep falloff, pressure was on Zinedine Zidane to replicate what he did in his first spell as Madrid boss but without the Portuguese icon. It's far to say that the Frenchman have delivered for Real Madrid yet again. Zidane had a fantastic spell for Los Blancos  between January 2016 to May 2018, winning nine trophies in the process including the 2016/17 La Liga title and three Champions League titles in a row, becoming the first manager in the Champions League era to win it in consecutive seasons. However, critics stated...

The nominees for the FIFPro XI were released today as the players nominated were recognized for their performances in the past football season for both club and country. However, some players on the list were given far too much credit that they deserve. Here are the 5 strangest nominees from the FIFPro XI. Karim Benzema How Karim Benzema got a nomination for the FIFA XI is beyond me given how poor he was last season to get the ball in the net. The Frenchman had his worst goalscoring season for Los Blancos, scoring just 12 goals in 47 appearances with only 5 goals each in La Liga and the Champions League. That as well as his broken relationship with France coach Didier Deschamps prevented him from getting to the French squad for the World Cup and it's unlikely he will make it back anytime soon. He's already one short from his goal tally from last season with 4 goals in just 3 leagues appearances which shows he bad he was last season. Yerry Mina A strong World Cu...

Julen Lopetegui ended his first competitive game in defeat as Atletico Madrid beat their city rivals Real Madrid 4-2 winning the UEFA Super Cup. This was Madrid’s first game without Zinedine Zidane and Cristiano Ronaldo starting Bale and Benzema together as well as Keylor Navas in goal as Thibaut Courtois wasn’t part of the matchday squad. Antoine Griezmann started for Atletico after winning the World Cup with France while Thomas Lemar and Rodri were given their full debuts. Diego Simeone was in the stands as his four-match ban by UEFA continues leaving his assistant German Burgos with the responsibilities on the touchline. The match was held at the A. Le Coq Arena in Tallinn, Estonia. Atletico took the lead in less than a minute from Diego Costa winning a header from Sergio Ramos before scoring from a tight angle. Real equalized before half-time when Karim Benzema headed the ball from a cross by Gareth Bale. The UEFA Champions League winners then took the lead from a penalty wh...