FIFA World Cup Qualifiers: Cometh the hour, cometh the man - The stage is set for Zlatan
A footballer’s worth
How do you measure a footballer’s worth? Is it all about the statistics, or is there something more to an athlete who has spent his entire career playing with that same round object? If we look past the numbers and figures, what else can be used to decide the “greatness” of a player? Titles, medals or individual honours? Team honours, perhaps?
If it’s medals and titles that are the only criteria for judging a footballer, then Zlatan Ibrahimovic can rest safe in the knowledge that he will be crowned one of the greatest to have played the game. A quick glance at the statistics tells the story of a footballer who has been there and done that, year after year, team after team.
His collection of individual honours is just as impressive as his fleet of cars. Not that he cares about public adulation and what the average football fan thinks of him, but Zlatan will be remembered all the same.
(At this point, the critic in you will quickly point out the one major trophy missing from Zlatan’s cabinet – the UEFA Champions League – although Ibrahimovic has featured in the knockout stages 10 times. This one glaring omission is enough for the critic to downgrade Zlatan’s status from a supreme footballer to one who is good, but not great.)
Born to win
There’s a popular saying in Italy – When the season starts (in August), every team has a chance to win. In May, Zlatan’s team wins the Scudetto.
Okay, maybe that’s a made-up quote, but the point stands. Except on two occasions (in the 2002-03 and 2011-12 season), Ibrahimovic has won the league title every season from 2001 to 2013 – a staggering 10 titles in 12 years. And in almost all of these title wins, it was Zlatan who played the biggest part, leading from the front and chalking up goal after goal, win after win.
His 280 goals and 107 assists in 549 games will no doubt attest to his omnipresence, consistency and performances.
Like a greedy child who is not satisfied with this flashy toys and who simply wants more, Zlatan has conquered four different countries with six different clubs in his never-ending quest of winning everything all the time.
An unquenchable thirst for winning is not the most appropriate phrase, but it’s the first one that comes to mind.
A case of “What if?”
Sweden is well known for its glass, IKEA and its propensity for liquor consumption. Unfortunately, football is not one of the things Sweden is known for. No doubt the country has produced great footballers (Henrik Larsson, Fredrik Ljungberg and Gunnar Nordahl spring to mind immediately), but not great teams.
The above-mentioned individuals too faced the same problems that Zlatan is at the moment; of being in the wrong place at the peak of their powers. An average FIFA ranking of 19 suggests that Sweden is neither a push-over nor a world-beater. Comfortably above-average would be a good approximation of the Swedish national team.
In this respect, Zlatan joins a long list of decorated footballers to have been born in the wrong country – men whose talent dwarfed that of their teammates to such an extent that they stood out like sore thumbs. Men who carried the burden of their less-talented teammates, all the while knowing that the team lacked what was needed to succeed at the biggest stage in football.
Perhaps all this is not enough to dissuade a footballer from giving his best for the country, but it does raise that inevitable question – what if? What if Zlatan was French, Spanish, Brazilian or German? For sure, things would have been very different.