Former teammate at LA Galaxy Ashley Cole said Milan veteran Zlatan Ibrahimovic ‘has two personalities’ and explained his ‘persona changed in front of the media’.
The former England international played with Ibrahimovic during their time together in Los Angeles between 2018 and 2019.
Cole spent one and a half years at Roma from July 2014, before joining LA Galaxy in January 2016 and roughly two years later he was joined by former Manchester United striker Ibrahimovic.
The 40-year-old spoke about his time with Ibrahimovic during his appearance at A League of their Own and revealed the Milan striker was brutally honest with his teammates in MLS.
“He has two personalities, with us in the dressing room he was brilliant, quiet, very humble but for the media he was God,” Cole said.
“He had moments where he would come in the dressing room and really let people know about their s*** touch, you can’t run, you’re slow but in front of the media his persona changed.”
Cole was the captain at LA Galaxy and revealed Ibrahimovic once confronted him.
“He tried to once, he did throw his hands in the air,” Cole revealed. “And I said: ‘Put your f****** hands down’, I’m deadly serious, honestly.
“I was thinking: ‘You might have a little point, but don’t put your hands up’.”
Cole later retired from playing in 2019 after his return to English football with Derby County, but Ibrahimovic is still going strong with the Rossoneri in Italy.
The Swede is preparing for his return to the pitch after a keyhole surgery on his left knee and could feature against Lazio this weekend and when Milan play Liverpool in the Champions League next week.
Ashley Cole recalls Zlatan Ibrahimovic dressing room clash – “Put your f***ing hands down!”https://t.co/CUMTsnwXzD pic.twitter.com/ARyuFQlx3A
— Mirror Football (@MirrorFootball) September 9, 2021
Zlatan is brash, no question. He occasionally makes sense like when he said athletes should just play rather than make political statements (in reference to his critique of Lebron James earlier this year). The flip side are instances when he was getting ready to leave the LA Galaxy I vividly recall his comments of “If I stay it will be good for MLS because the whole world will watch it. If I don’t stay, nobody will remember what MLS is.” Pompous p****. Having watched MLS from its inception, yeah I consider it a junior league compared to Europe, but it’s financially solvent and growing…guess people do remember the game is also played in North America, Zlatan, how about that?! With that said, I hope he gets on the field and drives AC Milan to glory this season.
When ronaldo goes to mls next season, people will watch mls again.
People don’t really remember…