Born in Wigan, but I think brought up in Warrington. Lived in Stockton Heath when he made his money and is buried in Wire Cemetary.
He's overrated, yes. But why does that mean he would flop at Spurs? He's finished 1st, with 4 different teams, in the 3 different leagues for 8 years running now, you can hardly say he has contributed nothing to those title wins. Is he a bit of a flat track bully? Yes, but so is Ronaldo.
He's not only overrated, but he also seems to believe he's as good as some people say, which is a dangerous combination. There are arrogant players out there, and there are overrated players out there, but not that many that are both arrogant and overrated. I reckon he'll be fine at a top team who are able to win their league title at a canter, which Ajax, Inter, Milan and Barca were all able to do. But if he's at a team like Spurs who are not likely to be fighting for the title I reckon his ego would rear its head and drag the rest of the team down. A bit like Robinho did at City.
What? Inter hadn't won a league title since 1989 before Ibrahimovic joined, and they won it in his first season there. Beating an AC Milan side who won the champions league, I'm sure you'll remember them as they demolished Man Utd 3-0. Juventus finished top twice with Ibrahimovic in the side, then he moved to Inter and Inter finished top. Last season he went to AC Milan and they finished top. Yes, he's just got lucky every single season for the last 8 years, even with Ajax they hadn't won a league title since he left until last season. Despite having players like Van der Vaart, Sneidjer, Suarez, Huntelaar and others in there at different times. There seems to be an interesting trend with Ibrahimovic, every club he goes to wins the league, you'd almost think he had something to do with it.
His performances at Ajax were great, but from there it's a bit spotty. His Juventus wins are pretty suspect given the match fixing scandal - who knows exactly how much of an influence that had on the titles? And at Inter the first title was against a Milan side that were docked 8 points for match fixing, right? With Inter able to pick and choose most of the players from the clubs that had been penalised. Inter were pretty much guaranteed dominance after that scandal, with so many of the other top clubs losing players and points. I'm not saying Ibrahimovic made no contribution, but I don't think he made the difference for any of his clubs - there were other more important factors for most of them. Also interesting how as soon as he left Inter they went on to win the CL, and his one season at Barca was the one season out of the past three they didn't win the CL.
But we're talking about Spurs here, not Barcelona or Inter Milan. Was Ibrahimovic a big reason Barcelona didn't win the CL? Yes, but was he a pretty big factor in them winning the league? Yes again. He was outstanding for them in the first half of the season, his big problem was that he fell out with Guardiola, partly because Guardiola didn't rate him as highly as he rated himself and also because of the fact Guardiola thought Messi would be better in the false 9 role so he shoved Ibrahimovic out wide. He has his flaws, just like every player, but I really don't see why Spurs should hope they don't sign Ibrahimovic, as he is a proven winner and proven goalscorer at the top level.
Regardless, they were factually champions. I wasn't trying to argue about his impact, just merely stating they won it the year previous.
True, but then I would class Ibra as a luxury player, and whereas Barca and Inter can probably get away with those kinds of players I'm not sure Spurs can. Yes he's a proven goalscorer, but he's also proven to be a potentially bad influence, and if he turns out that way at Spurs they wouldn't be able to sideline him as easily as Barca did. From a hypothetical point of view he'd be great, but practically at Spurs bringing in Ibra would mean shifting out / not bringing in another three players to balance the books, not to mention fiddling with the wage structure as all the high earners find they are now earning nowhere near as much as him.
True, but then Adebayor's baggage and ego issues aren't quite as big as Ibra's imo. And Adebayor is only on loan at Spurs, with City paying most of his wages. I think a full transfer for him, unless he agrees a big wage cut, would present the same problems as a move for Ibra. But then you may be right - stranger transfers have worked out well and ones that seem to make sense have gone horribly wrong!
Adebayor always starts well but tends to fade during the season, if I remember correctly he has only got more than 10 goals in a season 3 times in his whole career.
That is supposed to be OUR secret, you promised not to tell! Jese you think you know someone! .... you've changed
