Medical Analysis: Karim Benzema’s soleus injury & four things you need to know

Real Madrid’s lynchpin Karim Benzema has been struggling with a soleus injury that kept him out of El Clasico. Benzema made his best attempts to be ready but just didn’t have enough time to warrant the risk of playing, and will miss the upcoming slate of international duty games as well.

With the club heading into its final stretch of league games and the Champions League’ quarterfinals vs defending champions Chelsea, Benzema’s health will be paramount to the team’s chances.

In the following video, I detailed the injury, the four key things you need to know, and potential insight into the club’s medical decision-making:

As we learn more, I will keep you updated.

Dr. Rajpal Brar, DPT has a doctorate in physical therapy from Northern Arizona University, and runs his own in-person and online sports medicine and performance business, 3CB Performance, in West LA and Valencia, CA in which he further combines his movement expertise and fitness training. He also works at a hospital — giving him experience with patients in the immediate healthcare setting and neurological patients (post stroke, post brain injury) — and has been practicing for 4 years. Brar is additionally training at UCLA’s mindful awareness research center (MARC), has a background in youth football coaching and analyzes Los Blancos from a medical, skills, and fitness perspective for Managing Madrid and on his own YouTube Channel. You can follow him on Twitter at @3cbPerformance.