For every football team, a striker is one of the most important roles, and it’s difficult to imagine a team without a striker. It is the role every kid who dreams of becoming a footballer wants to play because strikers are the ones who have the responsibility to score goals. The main objective of a striker is to score goals and win the game for his team. And the one who scores the winning goal is often seen as the hero of the game.
Like any other club, Real Madrid has always looked forward to signing the best of strikers. And as a club with a rich history, the club has seen many great strikers wearing the royal white jersey and become legends of the club. So let’s have a look at the five best No. 9’s in the history of Real Madrid and look at some honorable mentions of players who don’t make the list.
Honorable mentions
Ruud Van Nistelrooy
Ruud Van Nistelrooy misses out from the main list, but he deserves an honorable mention, for his short but great career at Real Madrid. The Dutch international was signed for a fee of 14 million from Manchester United, in the summer of 2006. He was 30 back then and there was a striker like Ronaldo in the team, but van Nistelrooy still agreed to come to Madrid.
Due to Ronaldo’s injuries, van Nistelrooy got to start every LaLiga game, and he made his debut in a 0-0 draw against Villarreal. It didn’t take long for him to introduce himself, as he scored a hattrick in his second game against Levante. He scored 25 goals and won the Pichichi award for the 2006/07 season, as Real Madrid won LaLiga under Fabio Capello. Well, it was some start for the Dutch forward.
Ronaldo left Madrid, and he continued to be the club’s starter. He had a great second season at Madrid, as he led Real Madrid to the second league title in a row, and scored 20 goals in a season marred by injury. After two brilliant seasons, a lot was expected of him. But injuries curbed his third season as he played just 12 games and missed more than half of the season with a meniscus injury. He left the club in January 2010, with 64 goals and 16 assists to his name from 96 appearances.
Though he didn’t have a long career at Real Madrid, he left his mark and had some memorable moments. His goals looked simple to the eye, but the credit goes to Nistelrooy for making them look so simple. He was a perfect ‘poacher’, who knew how to be at the right place at the right time to score a goal. He was a perfect penalty taker as well, and people got used to seeing him stepping up confidently to take the penalties and smash them into the bottom corner.
The stint was short, but it had class written all over it.
Emilio Butragueno
The next player to get an honorable mention is the club’s current head of public relations, Emilio Butragueno. He was not exactly an out-and-out goalscorer, but he was a highly skillful footballer. He had excellent dribbling abilities and had a habit of scoring extraordinary goals. Butragueno is a La Fabrica graduate as well, and the Spanish international spent 12 years with the first team.
He made his first-team debut under Alfredo Di Stefano in 1984, as he went on to play 463 more games, scoring 171 goals for Los Blancos. He was a part of the ‘Quinta del Buitre’ which included Michel, Manolo Sanchis, Martin Vazquez, and Pardeza, and he formed a great attacking duo with one of the strikers who makes this list, Hugo Sanchez.
For everything, he had done for the club as a die-hard Madridista and is still doing as a member of Real Madrid’s board, he deserved an honorable mention. Few more honorable mentions include Fernando Morientes and Cristiano Ronaldo of 2016-18, who played as a center-forward in a 4-4-2 formation and was instrumental in winning 2 champions league titles.
5. Ronaldo Nazario
The fifth name on this list is that of one of the greatest footballers of all time, Ronaldo Nazario, who is popularly known as ‘El Fenomeno’, which meant the phenomenon. And he was truly a phenomenon. He had all the skills any player could only ever dream of. He was such a perfect footballer, and he had entertained the Real Madrid fans with his skills and goals for five seasons.
Florentino Perez had signed Ronaldo from Inter Milan, as a part of his Galactico policy, in 2002. He cost the club 46 million, and he was coming to Real Madrid after a successful World Cup campaign with Brazil. Despite suffering from a dangerous knee injury at Inter, which diminished a lot of his abilities, he still had the Brazilian flair in him and was one of the best strikers out there, if not the best.
His debut for Real Madrid was a delayed one due to an injury issue, but his first game for Madrid was a memorable one. He started his Real Madrid career with a bang, as it took him just 61 seconds after coming on as a substitute, to score against Alaves. He had a great first season, as he scored 30 goals in his return to Spain and led his club to a league title.
Those 30 goals included a hat-trick against Manchester United in the second leg of a UEFA Champions League quarter-finals. In my opinion, that game against United was his best in a Real Madrid shirt, and that performance warranted a standing ovation from Manchester United fans. Two of those three goals were unforgettable strikes from the Brazilian, and they would definitely make the list of his all-time top goals.
He kickstarted his Real Madrid career with such a wonderful season, and he went on to score a total of 104 goals in 177 appearances. He couldn’t win a Champions League title with Real Madrid, but he won 2 LaLiga titles, and a Supercopa de Espana medal as well. These numbers and achievements could’ve been a lot better, if not for Ronaldo’s recurring injuries and weight issues. But none of this undermines his status as one of Real Madrid’s legends and best strikers, despite playing just four and a half seasons at Real Madrid.
He was a player who had played for Barcelona in the past, but he had no issues in winning the support of Real Madrid fans, and he had the magical skills to woo every one of them. The serious knee injury did make him slower, but it didn’t change the quality inside him. He was still the same physical and skillful dribbler, and his habit of finishing the move with a calm and cool shot didn’t change.
He was one of the best dribblers at that time, and he never wasted a chance to show his skills. One of his favorite moves was to round the keeper in a 1v1 situation, before taking the shot. He used that skill to perfection and scored many such wonderful goals. And he was a magnificent goalscorer, who knew how to be at the perfect place and create something out of nothing. He wasn’t a poacher, but he did have some poaching qualities and he put them to use.
The fans of Real Madrid were really lucky enough to see such a talented player play for their club.
4. Santillana
The fourth name on this list is occupied by the legendary Carlos Santillana. He belongs to a category of players who retired at Real Madrid, a list that doesn’t contain many names. He was signed by the club in 1971 after the legendary Paco Gento had left the club. His signing wasn’t planned, as the club president Santiago Bernabeu had to go to watch a match of Racing Santander to scout a defender. But instead, he chose to sign the striker of Racing, who was none other than Santillana.
What happened in Santillana’s life after signing for Real Madrid is simply history, as he went on to become one of the greatest strikers in the history of Real Madrid. He has spent seventeen years with Real Madrid while wearing theNo. 9 jersey, before retiring in 1988. And he retired as a club legend, as the 2nd highest goalscorer of the club then, just behind Alfredo Di Stefano.
In those 17 years, Santillana accumulated 645 caps for Real Madrid and scored 290 goals. he was popularly known for his attacking partnership with the then-No. 7, Juanito, and both of them won many matches together. In his senior career which he entirely spent at Real Madrid, Santillana won 9 LaLiga titles, 2 UEFA Cups, and 4 Spanish Cups.
He was known to be the man of comebacks, as he had played a crucial role in many comebacks of Real Madrid in the 1970s and 80s in Europe. At the end of his career, he couldn’t be a starter anymore with Hugo Sanchez’s signing, but he happily accepted the role of a second-choice player and asserted that a transition is very important for a club.
Santillana was a prolific goalscorer and considered to be one of the best in his position back then. He had the ability to finish with both his feet. But if there is one trait of his that separates him from the rest, it has to be his heading skills. He had the ability to jump high and get his head onto the end of a cross in perfect fashion. Whenever he made a leap, it looked like the man was making the jump in slow motion, and scoring headers like a Hollywood hero. He was such a good header of the ball.
It would’ve always been difficult to forget such a legend while making the list of best strikers in the history of Real Madrid.
3. Hugo Sanchez
The next name on this list is that of the legendary Mexican striker, Hugo Sanchez. He was signed by Real Madrid from Atletico Madrid in the summer of 1984, and his transfer had an interesting story behind it. Sanchez was all set to switch from Madrid club to another, but Atletico didn’t want to anger their fans by announcing the deal directly. So they announced that Hugo Sanchez had moved to his boyhood club UNAM, And after 15 days, Real Madrid signed Sanchez from UNAM. What followed was just brilliance, seven seasons of pure brilliance.
He had proven himself while playing for Real Madrid’s local rivals Atletico Madrid, but he took his career to the next level at Real Madrid. Despite the presence of great strikers like Butragueno and Santillana in the club, he became the starter of the club and lead the magnificent attack of real Madrid with the Quinta Del Buitre behind him. In the seven seasons he spent at the Bernabeu, he had scored 208 goals in 292 appearances for Real Madrid. And he won 5 LaLiga titles, 1 UEFA Cup, 1 Copa Del Rey, and 3 Spanish Supercopas.
He was a fantastic goalscorer, and he was mostly known for his acrobatic goals and acrobatic celebrations. He had trained very hard to maintain his athleticism, which enabled him to score a lot of beautiful goals in his career. He was known as the man of ‘bicycle kicks’, thanks to his ability to attempt such goals with ease.
He had the ability to take thunderous free-kicks, with a technique that was later used a lot by the likes of Roberto Carlos. Despite being a left-footed player naturally, he had the ability to finish well with both these feet. And he was a great header of the ball, though he wasn’t that tall. Overall, he was a complete goalscorer who was a perfect blend of athleticism and technicality.
He set many records back then while playing for Real Madrid. He won four Pichichi awards in four consecutive seasons, and he also had set the record for winning the highest number of Pichichi’s back then. And he actually has a special record to his name, which will be very difficult to break or practically impossible in modern-day LaLiga. In the 1989/90 season, he had scored 38 league goals (which itself was a record), and the specialty is that every goal was scored with his first touch. So far only player has this record in LaLiga, and it’s him. This shows how rare such a record is!
2. Karim Benzema
Was there ever any doubt about our current No. 9 making it to the list? After everything he has done for the club for the past twelve years and for everything he is still doing, he deserves to be on this list of elites. Currently the fifth highest goalscorer in the history of Real Madrid, Benzema stands at the second position in this list.
Benzema was bought as a Galactico by Florentino Perez for a sum of 35 million euros in the summer of 2009, arriving at Madrid as a proven player, after a brilliant stint at Lyon. But he had a slow start to life at Real Madrid, as he scored just 9 goals and assisted another six in his debut season.
But he bounced back in the next three seasons under Jose Mourinho, as he scored 78 goals and had 49 assists to his name under the Portuguese. Though the manager preferred Gonzalo Higuain in certain situations, Benzema gained his place with his performances. He proved himself to be a consistent goalscorer and an excellent creator, the traits which were visible in Raul. Though he didn’t exactly play like Raul, he was pretty much the successor to the Eternal Capitan.
He couldn’t guarantee a goal in every game, but he could guarantee you a good game almost every time he steps onto the pitch. And if he couldn’t score, he would assist another teammate of his, with Cristiano Ronaldo being on the receiving end most of the time (Benzema has been assisted by Cristiano most of the time as well). He built an excellent partnership with the Portuguese, and the chemistry was often visible on the pitch with both of them adjusting perfectly to each other’s positioning and style of play.
He grew up to become one of the best strikers of all time, and he has proven himself to be a player who could guarantee you at least 20 goals per season. Currently, after 12 seasons at Real Madrid, Benzema has 277 goals in 555 games. As a great linkup player, he has 146 assists to his name and is the all-time highest assister of Real Madrid. When Karim said that he is a No. 9 with a soul of a No. 10, he wasn’t wrong.
He has won 3 LaLiga titles, 4 Champions League titles, 2 Copa Del Rey titles in his tenure at Real Madrid, and scored the opening goal in the 2018 Champions League final against Liverpool. He has scored 71 goals in Europe’s premier competition and is currently the joint fourth-highest goalscorer of the competition.
Despite all his achievements, he has often been an easy target for the fans and the Spanish media, whenever the team and himself were having a bad run. His finishing was often criticized by the critics, but he has silenced each one of them with his performances over the last three years. He has been the team’s main goalscorer and attacking leader since Ronaldo left. Hope he continues to do so for many more years to come and cements his name in the history books of Real Madrid as one of the biggest legends ever!
1. Ferenc Puskas
When you have a popular award of the modern game named after a specific player, you can easily get a measure of the greatness of that player. The same applies in the case of Ferenc Puskas, who in my opinion is the best striker Real Madrid has ever seen.
How rarely do we see Real Madrid buying players aged over 30? Ferenc Puskas was signed in 1958 at the age of 31, that too with him not having played football for the two years before his signing, due to a ban imposed by the Hungarian authorities. And not to forget that he was several kilos overweight, and his signing was heavily criticized in the media.
But guess what? This signing actually turned out to be a masterstroke, as Ferenc Puskas went on to score 242 goals in 262 games for Real Madrid in nine seasons. His goal ratio of 0.92 is second to only Cristiano Ronaldo, and he is the sixth on the list of all-time top goalscorers in the history of Real Madrid.
People always doubted Puskas, due to obvious reasons, but he answered his doubters without any delay as he scored a hat-trick in just his second Real Madrid game. From there he didn’t stop, and the flurry of goals continued to flow. He went to win two back-to-back European cups with Real Madrid, and he won those finals all by himself as he scored 7 goals in the 2 finals of 1959 and 1960. He didn’t start the 1966 European Cup final, but he was very crucial to the club on the road to the final.
In a 9-year stay at the Spanish Captial, Puskas won a total of 3 European Cups, 5 LaLiga titles, and 1 Spanish Cup, as he formed an excellent attacking trio along with Alfredo Di Stefano and Paco Gento. He had won the Pichichi four times, and won his last at the age of 37, even while he was past his prime. Such was the quality of Puskas in the attack.
He was naturally a left-footer and had a powerful shot. His positioning sense, movement, and timing of runs were so perfect that his skills could be used as parameters to build a perfect goal machine. His finishes were so precise that it looked as if Puskas was just a guide who knew how to guide the ball into the back of the net, to where it belongs, while appearing in the right place at the right time.
It was truly a pleasure to have such a legend of the game play for Real Madrid. And for me, it’s a no-brainer to select Puskas as the best Real Madrid striker ever.