Zlatan Ibrahimovic on his retirement from football: I just sometimes miss feeling… alive’’

Zlatan Ibrahimovic is currently an advisor to AC Milan’s board and an operating partner to the club’s majority owner Red Bird and is responsible for the sports and commercial strategy. ‘’I have a finger in many categories to bring results and bring up the value, all with an ambition to win,’’ says the Swede to The New York Times. 

The former striker also attends first-team training sessions of AC Milan twice a week as he observes the players train. ‘’But I’m not a babysitter. My players, they’re adults and they have to take responsibility. They have to do 200 per cent even when I’m not there.’’ 

Becoming a coach? 

Even though he’s still very involved in the sport, Ibrahimovic doesn’t want to become a coach. ‘’You see my grey hair?, he says when pointing at his black hair. ‘’Fully grey hair is after one week as a coach. A coach’s life is up to 12 hours per day. You absolutely don’t have free time. My role is to connect everything; to be a leader from above and make sure the structure and organisation works. To keep everybody on their toes.’’ 

Future endeavours in the entertainment industry, however, might be in the realm of possibility for one of football’s biggest personalities as he reveals he would make a great James Bond villain. ‘’I am curious about entertainment. But I only do things I believe in. I would not do it just to promote myself for nothing.’’ 

 

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Ibrahimovic also revealed that he misses playing football and the adrenaline it gives. “I would be the best in every ball sport. Martial arts – I could challenge. I used to do taekwondo. With my feet, I’m fast, I move well. I had the advantage of being 1.97m tall, but moved like a guy of 1.60m. That’s why I was a freak of nature. This is not me trying to impress you. These are true facts. But I like the adrenaline of taekwondo. I like duels. I need to feel alive. That is the only thing I miss with football. It’s not actually playing football. I just miss sometimes feeling… alive.’’ 

‘’Imagine you are in front of 80,000 people, my friend,’’ says Ibrahimovic. ‘’If you were so small, you would get so big. And imagine if you can get 80,000 to bounce or you can make them cry. This is who I was.’’ 

Fatherhood

This summer, the Swede’s 17-year-old son Maximilian signed his first professional contract at AC Milan and he couldn’t be more proud of him. ‘’It’s not easy for him because, obviously, his father is who he is. So he carries a heavy last name. Wherever he goes, he will always be compared. But at Milan, in my role, I don’t see him differently from other ones. I don’t judge him as my son. I judge him as a player, like I judge all the others. He has to learn, he has to work and he has to earn. Then what happens, happens. He’s strong mentally. People think football is easy and that everybody arrives. But it is not the case.”

Where Zlatan had a rough upbringing in Rosengård, one of Malmö’s poorest neighbourhoods, his son Maximilian had a very different one in terms of wealth and comfort. ‘’He has to get that drive I had in different ways. Where he gets it, you have to ask him. I can only talk as a father. I gave him discipline, respect, and the hard work thing. You want something, you work for it. You will get nothing for free here. And that is not only in the game. My job as a father is to make him independent when he grows up. If I don’t make him an independent, I failed.’’ 

 

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Comfort zone

In the interview, Zlatan also revealed why he changed clubs frequently. ‘’Changing clubs is to test myself. I take my backpack and I come to your garden. Different culture, different language, away from home. In your own garden, your mother cooks for you, cleans your clothes, you have everything you want. You were raised and born there. So you’re in a comfort zone. I go away from my comfort zone and I test myself.”