Last year, I lived three metro stops from the Santiago Bernabéu stadium in Madrid, and so I spent many evenings watching Karim Benzema. Real Madrid’s French forward — who last month won the Ballon d’Or for world’s best player, aged 34 — spends much of each game strolling around. He is scanning, clocking the location and directional movement of every player around him, as if that trademark bandage on his damaged right hand concealed a GPS. Then, when he suddenly breaks into a sprint, he is telling his teammates: “I have seen a gap. Give me the ball now.”
去年，我住在離馬德里圣地亞哥-伯納烏體育場三站地的地方，因此我花了很多晚上看卡里姆·本澤馬(Karim Benzema)的比賽。皇馬的法國前鋒上個月獲得代表世界最佳球員榮譽的金球獎的時候，已經34歲，他每場比賽的大部分時間都在散步。他其實是在進行掃描，記錄他周圍每個球員的位置和運動方向，就好像他受傷的右手上的標志性繃帶隱藏著一個GPS。然后，當他突然開始沖刺時，他是在向他的隊友們發出信號：“我已經看到了一個缺口。現在把球給我。”