Zlatan Ibrahimovic and the Champions League: A Tragedy?

March 7th, 2011 | by: aron | Comments Off

March ninth marks the next chapter in the Champions League career of Sweden captain Zlatan Ibrahimovic. Up till now it’s been a steady tale of loss and failure to get to the ever-elusive Champions League Final. It isn’t looking especially rosy this year either. Tottenham beat Milan at the San Siro with 1-0, meaning that only a victory at White Hart Lane will carry AC Milan through to the quarterfinals. AC Milan has leaned a lot on Ibrahimovic this season, expecting him to deliver both the creativity and goal scoring at the same time. Add to this the problem that some of the better players on the squad are ineligible for the Champions League, due to having appeared this season for another team (Van Bommel and Cassano). On top of all that good news, Boateng is out injured and Gattuso won’t escape the ban he brought upon himself for acting like an idiot in the home leg.

This begs the question of whether or not AC Milan is expecting too much from the Swede? The answer is that from great players, great things are expected. When these kinds of expectations are not lived up to, the players in question can be expected to bear an intense load of pundit and fan criticism. Never mind what they have accomplished previously with other clubs and under other circumstances, only today matters. In the case of Ibrahimovic the best place to turn to for criticism has been the English media. They seem to have their knives permanently sharpened whenever his name appears (though to be fair, they seem to hang onto the idea that they are the only ones who know how to play football). Players of all calibers have bad games and go through rough patches; some of them come back and reach new peaks while others let a bad run demoralize them.

Ibrahimovic was only a game away from the final last year with Barcelona. He scored three goals in the knockout stages, all of them away goals. Despite that, if AC Milan go crashing out this year, which is highly likely, the pens of the press are ready to slaughter him on their printing presses and write him off yet again as the player who only shows up against the minnows and can’t handle the big stage, never mind what he’s done before.

For Ibrahimovic time is running out when it comes to winning the Champions League. It will probably be this year and next year that he has his best chance of accomplishing this goal. Next season, if all the players that AC Milan have been acquiring recently are still around, the team will be a serious threat in Europe. Pato is showing signs of maturing and there are names for the future like Boateng and Merkel who will be even better next season. One or two games don’t forever shape the career of a player, but it would be nice to see him come out of his current bad run of form and lack-of-goals funk and produce the goods come Wednesday.  He is the kind of player who has enjoyed having the odds stacked against him before and delivering so lets see if he can produce some more magic. Here is hoping Ibracadabra is at his best.

For more information on the coming game please follow AC Milan at the offside.