French football expert Jonathan Johnson has provided some insight into Karim Benzema’s situation at Al Ittihad after a month of transfer gossip and speculation involving the French forward.
Benzema has clearly had some issues in Saudi Arabia and it looks like he was interested in a quick return to Europe, as we also saw from Jordan Henderson this January as he left Al Ettifaq for Ajax.
Speaking exclusively to CaughtOffside for the latest edition of his Daily Briefing column, Johnson explained that Benzema was keen on a move back to Europe and to his former club Lyon in particular.
The 36-year-old has also been linked with a move to another Saudi club, though Johnson is less sure about that proposed solution really answering the player’s issues as he’s keen to return to the more familiar setting of a competitive European team more suited to his style of play.
“Karim Benzema’s future has been the subject of much discussion this January and it’s been suggested that another solution could be found for him at a different Saudi club. My understanding, however, is that he would have rather gone back to Europe – I don’t think the issues he’s having where he is at this moment in time would be solved by another move, especially a temporary one, within the Saudi Pro League,” Johnson said.
“For Benzema, it’s more that he wants to be back at a more familiar stage and style of football. There’s a desire to stay at the top level of football for the time he has left in his career, and Lyon held a special attraction as they were his first club and it presented an opportunity to come back to France.
“It was a complicated deal for Lyon to work out, however, especially as Lyon had other pieces to put together to try their best to stay in Ligue 1. With Lyon, there was special interest from a special club, and that’s why Benzema was willing to listen, but I think in an ideal world he’d have rather returned to Lyon when they were still competing in Europe.”
He added: “If something like that comes up at the last minute then let’s see what happens, but at the time of writing it seems unlikely that anything is going to surface and that’s why, even though relations are a little tense at Al Ittihad, it seems most likely that this is just going to have to continue until it can be revisited in the summer.”
It’s clear that Benzema has not had the happiest of times in the Saudi Pro League and it will be interesting to see if we do get the chance to watch him in action for a European club again before his career comes to an end.