Karim Benzema and Alexia Putellas have been named the 2022 Ballon d’Or winners at the annual football awards ceremony in Paris.
After helping Real Madrid win the Spanish title and their 14th European Cup, Benzema has won the men’s prize for the first time. In addition to leading all scorers with 15 goals in the Champions League, the 34-year-old scored 27 goals in La Liga. Ten of those goals—including hat-tricks against Chelsea and Paris Saint-Germain—came in the knockout stages. Since Zinedine Zidane won the prize in 1998, he is the first Frenchman to have done so.
After receiving a huge ovation from the crowd, Benzema said: “This prize in front of me makes me really proud. I never gave up, it was a childhood dream. There was a difficult period where I wasn’t in the France team, but I kept working hard. I kept in my head this joy of playing football; I’m really proud of my journey here.”
The president of France, Emmanuel Macron, tweeted “KB9!” with a French flag after the result. Macron then posted a second tweet which read: “Two letters and a number that will go down in football history. Twenty-four years after Zidane, Karim Benzema brings a new Ballon d’Or to France. Congratulations to him!”
Putellas continues to hold the title of best female player in the world after helping Barcelona win another Spanish championship while contributing 18 goals. With the exception of losing to Lyon in the Women’s Champions League final and missing the Euros due to an ACL injury, Barça won all 30 of their league games in addition to the Spanish Cup and Super Cup.
“I’m very happy to be back here,” Putellas said. “Winning last year pushed me to want to be even better. Without my teammates, this wouldn’t have been possible. I want to thank the coaches and technical staff who help me to improve every day.”
Following in the footsteps of his teammate Pedri from the previous year, the Spain and Barcelona midfielder Gavi won the Kopa trophy for the best male under-21 player. After winning their fourth Premier League championship in five years, Manchester City was awarded club of the year.
FC Barcelona star Robert Lewandowski clinched the Gerd Muller Award, being recognized as the best striker.
Real Madrid star Thibaut Courtois was recognized as the best goalkeeper in the world, winning the Yachine Trophy.
Bayern Munich and Senegal striker Sadio Mane got the first-ever Socrates Award for their humanitarian efforts off the field.
The 2021–22 season, as opposed to the previous calendar year, was used to judge performances for the first time as a result of changes to the awards ceremony’s format, which were overseen by France Football magazine. A jury of 50 judges will decide on the winner of the women’s prize, while the men’s panel was cut from 170 to 100.