Zlatan Ibrahimovic used a late-night TV appearance ahead of the World Cup to needle American supporters, saying fans in the United States were softer than those in Europe and tying that to the way football is staged there. The former Sweden striker, who is set to commentate on the tournament for Fox, made the remarks on Jimmy Kimmel Live as he opened another round of the kind of blunt commentary that has long defined him.
He drew his comparison from his years with the Galaxy, saying that after losses he would leave the stadium and see fans laughing, eating tacos and waiting by his car. In Europe, he said, supporters wait at your house after a defeat, not by the car, and certainly not with a taco in hand. That contrast is what gave his latest interview its bite: Ibrahimovic was not only talking about the crowd, but about how much less severe defeat can feel in the US because the league has playoffs, which leaves regular-season results with less weight than in the bigger European leagues.
He said the difference was not about character so much as structure. In America, he said, you can lose in the regular season and still make it up in the playoffs; in Europe, there is pressure from the first bad result, and after five minutes of booing you feel it. The point lands differently because Ibrahimovic has lived both sides of it. He said that during his time at PSG, away in Marseille, knives were thrown onto the pitch, and that after seeing one thrown at his team he told teammates to celebrate the next goal in the centre of the pitch if they wanted to get out alive.
He also said he lived in Beverly Hills for two years and never spoke to his neighbours, a line that fits the same mixture of detachment and swagger. In the same interview, he waved away comparisons with Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo by saying, “Who’s better between Messi and Ronaldo? I say Zlatan.” He joked that Fox is paying him a lot to call the World Cup and that he does not work for free, then compared himself with Charles Barkley, saying he won in his career while Barkley did not.
What remains unclear is how often Ibrahimovic will be on air and in what format Fox plans to use him during the World Cup. He joked that if the level was right he could announce a return to playing, but for now his next public role is as a commentator — and the network is buying one thing above all else: the unfiltered version of Zlatan.
