Benzema wins Ballon d'Or; Gavi best U21 player

Karim Benzema was awarded the 2022 Ballon d'Or astatine a ceremonial successful Paris connected Monday aft a stellar 2021-22 play saw him pb Real Madrid to a Champions League and LaLiga double.

Benzema, 34, scored a career-best 27 times successful LaLiga past play and was apical scorer successful the Champions League with 15 goals, including chapeau tricks against Paris Saint-Germain and Chelsea.

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He finished up of Bayern Munich's Sadio Mane and Manchester City's Kevin de Bruyne, who came successful 2nd and third, respectively. PSG striker Kylian Mbappe came successful sixth place, portion Manchester United guardant Cristiano Ronaldo finished successful 20th.

"I'm truly arrogant seeing this prize, it's been my imagination since I was a kid. I grew up with this successful my head, and aft that I had the motivation," Benzema said.

"I had 2 relation models successful my life: Zizou [Zinedine Zidane] and [Brazil legend] Ronaldo. It's a batch of work, I ne'er gave up and I kept that imagination successful my head. Anything is possible.

"It's been hard for me. There was a clip erstwhile I wasn't playing for the nationalist team, but I didn't springiness up. It's been hard for maine and that conscionable makes maine stronger mentally. I'm truly blessed with my work."

The France planetary picked up the prize -- which is awarded by the mag France Football -- for the archetypal clip successful his vocation astatine a ceremonial astatine the Theatre du Chatelet successful Paris.

A time earlier, Benzema opened the scoring arsenic Madrid bushed Barcelona 3-1 successful El Clasico to spell 3 points wide astatine the apical of the LaLiga table.

He is the archetypal Madrid subordinate to person the grant since Luka Modric successful 2018, and the the archetypal Frenchman to triumph since Zidane successful 1998, who awarded Benzema the trophy.

"I'd similar to convey my teammates astatine Real Madrid and the nationalist team, my president [Florentino Perez] who is similar household to me, and besides the Lyon academy and president [Jean Michel] Aulas, acknowledgment to him I fulfilled my imagination of playing for Real Madrid," Benzema added.

Lionel Messi won the grant successful 2019 and 2021, portion nary Ballon d'Or was fixed retired successful 2020 owed to the COVID-19 pandemic.

In 13 years astatine Madrid helium has lifted 5 Champions League trophies, 4 LaLiga titles, 2 Copas del Rey, 4 UEFA Super Cups and 4 Spanish Supercopas.

Benzema received wide designation for his performances successful the Champions League past season, scoring 10 goals successful Madrid's knockout signifier wins implicit PSG, Chelsea and Manchester City connected the mode to winning the club's 14th European Cup.

After a six-year lack from the France nationalist team, helium returned to assistance them triumph the UEFA Nations League successful 2021 and is expected to pb their onslaught astatine the 2022 World Cup successful Qatar.

Earlier successful the ceremony, Barca midfielder Gavi won the Kopa Trophy, the grant presented to the champion subordinate nether the property of 21.

Gavi, who turned 18 successful August, claimed the prize up of Borussia Dortmund's Jude Bellingham and Bayern Munich's Jamal Musiala. He succeeds Barca teammate Pedri, who was past year's winner.

After breaking into the archetypal squad setup astatine the property of 16 past year, Gavi went connected to marque 47 appearances for Barca successful each competitions successful 2021-22, scoring 2 goals.

His performances for the Catalan nine earned him a call-up to the Spain nationalist squad and helium became the youngest subordinate to ever correspond La Roja astatine the property of 17 years and 62 days.

Gavi has since won 12 caps for Spain and is simply a regular for nine and state heading into adjacent month's World Cup.

Meanwhile, Robert Lewandowski won the Gerd Muller grant for the champion striker of the year, and Madrid's Thibaut Courtois won the Lev Yashin grant for champion goalkeeper.

Ballon d'Or organisers added a humanitarian prize named aft the precocious Brazil midfielder Socrates. The trophy went to Mane for his foundation enactment successful Senegal including gathering a infirmary and schoolhouse donations.