Manchester United striker Zlatan Ibrahimovic has been pegged for a December come back from the knee ligament injury that he suffered this past April. When he does return, whether that’s in the 12th month, or in the new year, he has his eyes fixated on winning a Premier League title.
If you’re looking to bet on the league title race, at free casinos, you’ll see that United are currently being backed with the second best odds, behind current table toppers Manchester City, but the gap between the two Manchester clubs is massive. Sky Bet has City at 1/5 odds to win the league, with United showing 9/1.
Ibrahimovic won three trophies during his first season at Old Trafford, a campaign in which he was far and away the club’s leading scorer, but also saw his year cut short in the UEFA Europa League quarterfinal against Anderlecht.
“I said I have come back to finish what I started,” Ibrahimovic told Sky Sports.
“Everything I built up in the first season – obviously we won the three trophies – the ending for me was not the ending I wanted, or nobody wanted, especially after how the season went. The target is the Premier League. That is my target to finish.
“Everything I started in the first season, we will finish in the second one.”
With the win over Tottenham Hotspur today, United are now alone in second place in the Premier League, five points behind Manchester City. When Ibra went down with a serious injury last spring, there were a lot of people who believed he might never ever play again.
That was exactly the inspiration Zlatan needed get himself re-focused and motivated.
“In that moment when it happened, it was easier for me to say that I would come back because then I had a challenge,” the man with 28 goals across all competitions last season continued.
“The challenge was that I never had a major injury, and all these people talking that ‘it’s over’ or ‘he’s too old’, all these doubts that I had in my whole career. When that happens, it triggers me because it gives me energy and an objective. I’m challenging what I am able to do, how far I can take my body.”
The 36-year-old Swede added some major big picture perspective into this interview as well.
“In the last years, when you’re thinking how many more years you are going to play, that is where you are hesitating. But the injury made it easy for me. I had one target, and that is to come back and play the game.”
Paul M. Banks runs The Sports Bank.net and TheBank.News, which is partnered with News Now and Minute Media. Banks, a former writer for the Washington Times, NBC Chicago.com and Chicago Tribune.com, currently contributes regularly to WGN CLTV and Chicago Now.
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