Due to a tear in the left thigh, Karim Benzema is forfeited for the 2022 World Cup

We don’t know yet how it will end. But the story of the French team in Qatar could hardly have started worse. Four days after the arrival of the Blues in the Arabian Peninsula, Didier Deschamps lost one of his new pillars. After N’Golo Kanté, Paul Pogba, Presnel Kimpembe, it’s Karim Benzema’s turn to give up his World Cup dreams. Three days before the start of the World Cup, the Ballon d’Or 2022 was injured in training. He suffers from a tear in his left thigh which deprives him of any hope of playing his second World Cup.

It’s a huge blow for the Blues. Didier Deschamps sees the best player of the year 2022, who carried Real Madrid to European heights, having to retire. Arrived injured Monday at Clairefontaine, the former Lyonnais complained of persistent discomfort in one thigh for several weeks. But if his last match played in full dates back to October 19, an Elche – Real in La Liga, won by Madrid 3-0 with a goal from the Frenchman, there was still hope of seeing him in Blue in Qatar.

On Saturday, KB9 also participated in its first collective training since the start of the rally. But his body failed him again. And this thigh injury will push him to come home faster than expected. “I am extremely sad for Karim who made this World Cup a major goal. Despite this new blow for the French team, I have full confidence in my group. We will do everything to meet the immense challenge that awaits us“said Didier Deschamps in the press release from the FFF.

Benzema dreamed of surfing on his Ballon d’Or to finally shine at the World Cup. But his history with the most prestigious of international competitions continues to be frustrating. Not retained by Raymond Domenech in 2010, dismissed in 2018 by Didier Deschamps for the reasons that we know, he has only five small matches on the clock for three goals and an elimination in the quarter-finals of the 2014 World Cup. See you soon 35 years, his chances of participating in a new World Cup are now very slim.

For the France team, we will now have to find how to rebuild without him, which should give Olivier Giroud the opportunity to shine once again. But after the absences of Pogba and Kanté at the heart of the game, it’s a serious blow for Didier Deschamps, who has until Monday, the day before France – Australia, to make a last minute replacement. Unless the boss of the Blues wants to stay at 25. And not try to replace the irreplaceable: a Ballon d’Or title.