Thaindian News

Madrid, Oct 19 (IANS) Real Madrid striker Karim Benzema has ended the debate on himself or fellow forward Gonzalo Higuain leading the side’s attack, saying there is no competition between them.

Benzema was in Real Madrid’s starting 11 that defeated Olympique Lyon in a Champions League match Tuesday night despite Higuain having scored two hat-tricks in his last two league appearances.

If the former Lyon striker felt under pressure, however, he didn’t show it, opening the scoring and setting up Sami Khedria’s goal early in the second half as Madrid romped to an easy 4-0 win to maintain their 100 percent record in Europe.

Speaking in Wednesday’s edition of sports paper Diario AS, Benzema insisted that he and Higuain were not in competition with each other.

“We are quite similar players, he is a great player and we could play together in attack and there are no problems at all between us and there is no competition. We are two players who aim to help our team,” said Benzema.

The striker reflected on his own performance in what was his first start since suffering a muscle injury three and a half weeks ago.

“I had a good game and so did the whole team. There was a lot of pressure on me before the game. Lyon are a good side but we played very well to win,” he said of the triumph which leaves Madrid just a win off assuring their place in the knockout stage.”

Benzema added that he had not found it easy to play against a club where he had spent all of his career before moving to Spain two seasons ago.

“It is always hard to play against Lyon, because it has been my side ever since I was a boy. But now I play for Real Madrid,” he said.