”Ibra, get in here!

Fabio Capello, maybe the most successful coach in Europe the last ten years, was calling for me, and I thought: What have I done now? All the anxiety from my childhood came back, and Capello could make anyone nervous. Wayne Rooney has said that when Capello walks past you in the hall, it kind of feels like you’re dead, and it’s true. He used to just take his coffee and pass you without a look, and it was almost scary. Sometimes he muttered “ciao”. Other times he just disappeared, and it felt like you hadn’t even been there.

I said that the stars in Italy don’t jump just because the coach says so. That doesn’t apply to Capello. Every player stands in line when he shows up. You behave before Capello, and I know a journalist who asked about this:

“How do you get such a respect from everyone?”

“You don’t get respect. You take it”, Capello answers, and that’s something I’ve remembered.

When Capello got angry you hardly dared to watch him in the eyes, and if he gives you a chance and you don’t take it, you basically have to start selling hot dogs outside the stadium for a living. You don’t go to Capello with your problems; he’s not your friend. He doesn’t talk to the players, not like that. He is sergente di ferro, the sergeant of steel, and it’s not a good sign when he’s calling for you. On the other hand you never know. He breaks you down and builds you up. I remember a training session when we just had started doing some position play. Then Capello whistled his whistle, and shouted: “Get in. Get out of the pitch”, and no one understood.

“You’ve been slow. You’ve been shit.”

We didn’t get to train more that day, and it felt confusing, but of course, he had a thought. He wanted us to come pumped as warriors the next day, and I liked that style, because like I said, I’m not raised with cutie. I like guys with power and attitude and Capello believed in me.

“You don’t have anything to prove, and know who you are and what you can do”, he said in one of the first days, and that gave me security. I could loosen up a little bit. There had been a big amount pressure. Several papers had questioned the buy and written that I had scored to few goals. Many thought that I was going to be benched. How can Zlatan take place in a squad like this?

“Is Zlatan ready for Italy?” they wrote.

“Is Italy ready for Zlatan?” Mino countered, and that was correctly said.

You should answer with quotes like that. You had to play tough back, and sometimes I wonder: would I have made it without Mino? I don’t think so. If I had arrived to Juventus like I arrive to Ajax, the press would have eaten me. In Italy they’re crazy about football, and if we in Sweden write about the games the day before and after, they go on for the whole week in Italy. It just goes on, and you’re graded all the time. You’re inspected up and down, and before you get used to it it’s rough.

But I had Mino. He was like a wall of defense, and I called him all the time. I mean: Ajax, what was that? A small school in comparison! If I was going to score in training I didn’t have only Cannavaro and Thuram to get through, Buffon was in the goal as well, and no one treated me kindly just because I was new, it was the other way around.

Capello had an assistant named Italo Galbiati. Galbiati was an older man, I called him Old man. He was cool. He and Capello are a little bit of bad cop, good cop. Capello tells you the hard, tough things whilst Galbiati takes care of the rest, and already after the first training session Capello sent me to him:

“Italo, give the kid a hard time!”

The rest of the team had hit the showers, and I was all done. I would have loved to follow the rest of the team. But from the side a goal keeper from the junior’s came, and I started to get it. Italo was going to feed me balls, bam, bam. They came against me from all different angles. There were crosses, passes, he threw the ball, he made one two’s, and I shot against the goal, and was never supposed to leave the box, the penalty area. It was my area, he said. That was the place I was supposed to be and make shots, shoot, and there wasn’t any talks of resting or taking it easy. It was a high tempo.

“Get them, harder, more determined, don’t hesitate”, Italo shouted, and that became a routine, a habit.

Sometimes Del Piero and Trezeguet came down also, but usually it was only me. It was me and Italo, and it was fifty, sixty, a hundred shots towards the goal. Sometimes Capello showed up, and he’s like he is. “I’m going to beat Ajax out of your body”, he said.

“Alrigh, sure.”

“I don’t need that Dutch style. One, two, one, two, one two’s, make a trick and play technically. Dribble through the whole team. I can make it without all that. I need goals. You get that! I have to get the Italian way in you. You have to get more killer instinct.”

It was a process that had already started in me. I had my talks with van Basten, and with Mino. But I still didn’t see me as a real goal getter, despite my place being up top. I was more the guy who should know everything, and there was still a lot of mom’s block and tricks in my head. But under Capello I changed. His toughness infected me and I became less of an artist and more of a slugger who wanted to win at all costs.

Not that I didn’t want to win before. I was born a winner. But still, don’t forget, football had been my way to show myself! The tricks had helped me become someone else than another kid from Rosengård. It was all the “Oh, oh”, “Wow, look at that!” that had gotten me started. It was the applauses for the tricks that had made me grow, and for a long time I would have seen you as a stupid person if you’d said that an ugly goal was as important as a beautiful one.

But now I started to get it more and more, no one will thank you for your art and back heels if your team loses. No one even cares if you’ve scored a dream goal if your team don’t win, and slowly I became tougher and more of a warrior on the pitch. Of course I didn’t stop with that listen, don’t listen. Didn’t matter how strong and hard Capello was, I stocked to my own stuff. I remember the classes in Italian. It wasn’t always easy with the language. On the field it was never a problem. Football has its own language. But outside I felt lost at times, and the club sent an Italian teacher to me. I was supposed to meet her two times a week and learn grammar. Grammar? Was I back in school, or what? I couldn’t do it. I told her:

“Keep the money and don’t tell anyone, no your boss, no one. But stay at home. Act like you’ve been here, and please don’t take it personally”, and sure enough, he did like I said. She went and acted. But don’t think that I didn’t care about learning Italian.

I really wanted to learn, and I got it in other ways, in the dressing room and at the hotels, and I could connect the dots easily. I learned fast and I was stupid and cocky enough to dare to talk even if the grammar came out wrong. Even before journalists I started with Italian before I started with English and I think that was appreciated. Here’s a guy, like, who maybe can’t, but he tries, and I did that with almost everything, I listened. I didn’t listen.

But still, in a short time I changed both in the head and body. I remember the first game in Juventus. It was the twelfth September and we were facing Brescia, and I started on the bench. Up in the honorary section the owner family Agnelli sat and of course, they were checking especially me out: Like, is he worth the money? After the break I came in for Nedved, Nedved who was also Mino’s guy and had been chosen as the best player in Europe the year before and possibly was the biggest training addict I’ve ever met. Nedved was on the bike for an hour before practice on his own. And afterwards he ran as long. He was not an easy player to replace, and it’s true, it’s no catastrophe if the first game is bad. But it’s not going to help you either, and I remember that I ran on the left side and got two defenders against me. The situation seemed locked. But I rushed, and broke through and scored and heard the supporters scream from the stands: “Ibrahimovic, Ibrahimovic!” It was powerful, and it wasn’t going to be the last time.

I was started to get called Ibra then – and it was Moggi who came up with it – or even the Flamingo for a time. I was still kind of skinny. I was hundred ninety six centimetres long but weighed only eighty four kilo, and Capello saw it as to little.

“Have you ever worked out in the gym?” he asked.

“Never”, I said.

I had never even held a barbell, and he treated it as a minor scandal. He told the fitness coach to press me hard in the gym, and for the first time I started to care about what I put in me, alright, maybe it was still too much pasta, that would punish me later. But everything was more accurate in Juventus and I gained weight and became a heavier and stronger player. I Ajax they let the guys do kind of what they wanted.

That’s really strange with all the talent in mind! In Italy we ate both before and after the practice and before the games we lived in hotels and had three meals together every day.

I got up to ninety eight kilo at most, but that felt as too much. I became clumsy, and had to do a little less workout and more running. But on the whole I changed to a tougher, faster and better player, and I learned to be completely respecting less towards the big stars. It doesn’t pay off to step aside. Capello made me understand that. You have to take your place. The stars shouldn’t hamper you, it’s the opposite. They should trigger you, and I started to grow. I got respect, or rather, I took it. Step by step I became who I am today, the one that steps out from a lost game angry as a mad man and no one dares to come close, and absolutely, it can seem negative. I scare a lot of young players. I scream. I rage.

But I bring that attitude with me since Juventus, and just like Capello I decided to not care about whom people were. Their name could be Zambrotta or Nedved, if they didn’t give it all in practice, they would hear about it. Capello didn’t just beat Ajax out of me. He made me the guy that comes to a club and demands that the league title should be won, no matter that, and that has helped me a lot, no doubt about it. It changed me as a football player.

But it didn’t make me calmer. We had a defender in the team, a French guy named Jonathan Zebina. He had played in Roma with Capello and won the scudetto with the club in 2001. He was with us now. I don’t think he felt so good. He had personal problems and on training he played aggressively. One day in training he brutally tackled me. I stepped up to him and stood real close: “If you want to play dirty, tell me, so that I can play dirty back!”

Then he head butted me, just bam, and after that it went fast. I didn’t have the time to talk. It was a pure reflex. I hit him and it happened right away. He wasn’t even done with the head butting. But I must have punched hard. He went down in the grass, and I had no idea what I was expecting. A crazy Capello who maybe ran and yelled. But Capello just stood there a bit away from us just ice cold like it didn’t even have anything to do with him. Everyone else was talking: What happened? What is this? There was buzzing everywhere, and I remember Cannavaro, Cannavaro and I always helped each other. “Ibra”, he said. “What have you done?” For a moment I thought he was upset.

But then he blinked, like, Zebina deserved that. Cannavaro didn’t like the guy either, not like he had behaved lately, but Lillian Thuran, the French guy, did it in another style.

“Ibra”, he said. “You’re young and stupid. You can’t do that. You’re just dumb.” But he didn’t have the time to say more. A roar echoed over the whole pitch and there was only one person who could scream like that.

“Thuuuuuraaam”, Capello screamed. “Shut up and get away from there”, and obviously, Thuram got away, he became like a little child, and I got also out of there, I needed to cool down.

Two hours later I saw a guy in the massage room who had an ice bag pushed to his face. It was Zebina. I must have punched him really hard. He was still in pain. He was going to have a black eye for a long time, and Moggi fined the both of us. But Capello never did anything. He didn’t even call for a meeting. He just said one thing:

“It was good for the team!”

That was all. He was like that. He was hard. He wanted adrenalin. You were allowed to fight, and the

pumped like a bull. But there was one thing you definitely weren’t allowed to do: challenge his authority or

behaving with arrogance (ed note: problem with translating again. But we’re not talking about the type of

arrogance Ibra is ‘famous’ for. But the type of arrogance where you think you can win without giving your

best). Then he flipped out. I remember when we were playing a quarter final against Liverpool in the

Champions League. We lost by two-zero, and before the game Capello had made the tactics and decided

who was going to cover who when Liverpool had a corner. But Lillian Thuram decided to change player.

He covered another Liverpool player and on that occasion they scored. In the dressing room afterwards

Capello made his ordinary walk up and down while we were all sitting there on the bench in a ring around

him and wondered what was going to happen.

“Who told you to change player?” he said to Thuram.

“No one, but I figured it would be better that way”, Thuram answered.

Capello took a couple of breaths.

“Who told you to change player?” he repeated.

“I thought it would be better that way.”

It was the same explanation again, and Capello asked the question for a third time and got the same answer again. Then the outbreak came, the one that had been waiting in him like a bomb.

“Have I told you too change player or what? Is it me or someone else who’s in charge? It’s me, you hear that! I’m the one who tells you what to do. Do you understand that?”

Then he kicked the massage bench towards us with a big fucking power, and in times like that no one dared to look up. Everyone is just sitting there around him and stare to the ground, everyone, Trezeguet, Cannavaro, Buffon, every single one. No one moved, and no one would ever think of doing what Thuram did again. No one wanted to meet those raging eyes again. There was a lot of that. It was tough. There weren’t small expectations. But I continued playing good.

Capello had substituted Del Piero to give me a place, and no one had benched Del Piero in ten years’ time. To bench Del Piero was like putting the symbol of the club on the bench, and that made the fans crazy. They booed Capello and yelled at Del Piero – “Il pinturicchio, il fenomeno vero.”

Alessandro Del Piero had won the league seven times with Juventus and had been a key player every year. He had won the Champions League with the club and he was loved by the owners. He was the big star. No, no normal coach bench Del Piero. But Capello wasn’t normal. He didn’t care about history or status. He just picked his team, and I was grateful for that. But it also put pressure on me. I must play especially good when Del Piero was on the bench, and indeed, I heard less and less of his name from the stands. I heard “Ibra, Ibra”, and in December the fans chose me as the player of the month, and that was big.

I was really breaking through in Italy, but still and I knew that of course, you need so little in football. One moment you’re a hero, in the next you’re shit. The special training with Galbiati had given results, no doubt about that. By being fed with balls in front of the goal I had become more efficient and tougher in the box. I had a whole new set of situations in my blood, and I didn’t need to think as much, it just happened, bam, bam.

Still and you don’t forget that: being dangerous in front of goal is a feeling, an instinct. You either have it or you don’t. You can conquer it, sure, but then lose it again when the feeling and the confidence disappears, and I had never seen myself as a goal scorer. I was the player who wanted to make a difference on the pitch. I was the one who wanted to know how to do everything, and sometime in January the flow disappeared.

I didn’t score in five rounds. In three months I only scored once, I don’t know why. It just became like that, and Capello started to attack me. As much as he had built me up before, he was putting me down now. “You haven’t done a shit. You’ve been worthless”, he said, but at the same time, he let me play.

He still had Del Piero on the bench and I guessed that he yelled because he wanted to motivate me, I was hoping that was the case at least. Capello wanted his player to believe in themselves, but they weren’t allowed to get too cocky. He hated that and that’s why he did stuff like that. He builds you up, and breaks you down, and I had no idea what was going on now. “Ibra, get in here!”

The anxiety of being called to a meeting never ends for me, and I started wondering: Have I stolen a bike again? Or head butted the wrong guy? On my way to the dressing room where he stood and waited I tried to think of smart excuses. But it’s hard when you don’t know what it’s all about. I just had to hope for the best, and when I came in Capello had only a towel around him. He had taken a shower. The glasses were fogy, and the dressing room was as worn out as usual. Luciano Moggi loved nice things. But the dressing rooms should be worn out. It was a part of his philosophy. “It’s more important to win than having it nice”, he used to say, and alright, sure, one can agree with that. But if we were four people in the shower at once the water rose on the floor up to the calves, and everyone knew that complaining wouldn’t do any good. Moggi would just see it as a confirmation to his theory:

“You see, you see, it doesn’t need to be fantastic for you to win”, and that’s why it was like it was and Capello came against me half naked in that worn out room, and I wondered once again: What is it? What have I done to you? There’s something with Capello, especially when you’re alone with him that makes you feel small. He grows. You shrink.

“Sit down”, he said, and alright, sure, of course, I sat down. In front of me there was an old television with an even older VHS-player and Capello put a video cassette in it. “You remind me of a player I coached in Milan”, he said.

“I think I know who you’re talking about.”

“You do?”

“I’ve heard it many times.”

“Perfect, and don’t get stressed by the comparison. You’re not a new van Basten. You have your own style, and I see you as a better player. But Marco van Basten had better movement in the box. Here’s a movie where I’ve collected all his goals. Study his movements. Suck them in. Learn from them.”

Then Capello got out of there, and I was alone in the dressing room and started to look, and really, it was really van Basten goals, from every corner and angle. The ball was just bombed in and Marco van Basten was there again and again, and I sat there ten minutes, fifteen and wondered when I could go.

Did Capello have anyone who was watching outside the door? It wasn’t impossible. I decide to look through the whole cassette. It was twenty five, thirty minutes long, and then, alright, I thought. Nu it’s enough. I got out of there. I snuck out, and honestly, I don’t have a clue if I had learned anything. But I got the message; it was the same old thing. Capello wanted to make me score goals. I was supposed to get it in my head, in the movements, in my whole system and I knew that it was serious.

We were at the top of the league, alongside Milan, we changed between the number one and two spot and for us to win I needed to continue scoring goals. That was the truth, nothing else, and I remember that I really worked hard up there in the box. Bu I was well marked as well.

The opponent defenders were on me like wolves, and it started to get known that I have a temper. The players and the crowd tried to provoke me all the time with dirty tackles and taunts and shit. Gipsy, stuff about my mom and my family, they shouted everything, and sometimes it got to me. There were some head butts, or something of the kind where I tried to get even. But I play my best game when I’m angry, and everything just let go. The seventeenth April I scored a hat trick against Lecce, and the fans got wild and the journalists wrote:

“They said that he score to few goals. He’s already done fifteen now.”

I went to the third spot amongst the top scorers in the league. They talked of me as the most important player for Juventus. There were accolades everywhere; it was “Ibra, Ibra”. But something else was in the air as well.

Catastrophes were luring around the corner.