England vs Sweden was supposed to be a friendly match to open the new Friends Arena in Stockholm. However, it will be remembered as the “Zlatan Show.”
Zlatan Ibrahimovic defeated England with four goals and finished a bicycle kick from almost 30 meters – the goal of the decade. The 4th goal was pure magic and nobody will see a goal like this again. Ibrahimovic scored his hat-trick in 20 minutes. The 31-year-old from Paris St. Germain played an incredible game. Ibrahimovic said: “It was a good day for me, but without my teammates, it would not have been possible to score the goals.” He smiled gently and said that it was both luck and skill.
Ibrahimovic was more than pleased after the game as he always felt underestimated in England. At the 2006 World Cup, Martin O’Neill that he is the most overrated player in the world. After the game, Ibrahimovic said: ‘That’s the way it is with the English. If you score against them you’re a good player, if you don’t score against them you’re not a good player. I remember Lionel Messi before the 2009 Champions League Final. Then he scored against Manchester United and suddenly he was the best player in the world. Maybe now they’ll say something like that about me.” Certainly, the game gave Ibrahimovic a sense of satisfaction to prove his critics. However, will he ever play in the Premier League?
Ibrahimovis’s 4th goal, at least, is on the same level as Roberto Carlos free-kick in 1997. Even Steven Gerrard, who earned his 100th cap, admitted: “This was a world-class performance from a world-class player in Ibrahimovic. It (the fourth goal) is the best goal I have seen live.”
Ibrahimovic had a busy career so far and won 8 league titles and a total of 18 titles in three countries. He was named Swedish footballer of the year for the 7th time and he played for the biggest clubs in the world such as Inter Milan, AC Milan, Juventus, FC Barcelona and PSG.
