Zlatan Ibrahimovic Transfer Speculation

Shez said:
Not sure I get what the talks are about? Its a renewal clause so if both parties want to extend it, what is there to talk about? I'm assuming the whole point of a renewal clause is that salary negotiations don't have to take place?
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More money, I'd imagine.

Why else would he be playing it coy, what would there possibly be to gain from him constantly talking to press about it?

Devil may care said:
Can't say I'm particularly enthusiastic about this, I think a lot of the same problems we've had this season will persist with our attack solely catered to a striker that doesn't move very much and hasn't got any pace, he's also a poor fit with everyone's fav Griezmann.
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Devil may care said:
I think experience is highly overrated, Spurs have a set of players that have never won anything and are comfortably ahead of of us in the PL, same goes for Dortmund and Monaco who are thriving in the CL. Experience becomes a crutch when it's married to someone that also has negatvie effects on the team. Ibra is a big character but everything is about him not the team, the rest of our attackers play in subservience to him and I think it's part of the reason we struggle against tightly packed teams, we don't operate as an attacking unit, we operate as a single attacking entity. For all the experience we have done nothing for 4 seasons as regards the league, failing to qualify for the CL twice with a third time being a very distinct possibility, I think it's time we freshened up and stopped looking to the past with stop gaps and start building a team as opposed to a showcase for an individual.
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Terminator said:
We'll be fighting for top 4 yet again next season if he is our main striker and Jose insists on playing him every single minute.
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Agree totally with these posts.

Let him go and bring in a peak years striker (preferably from a rival), and start really playing some fast, contemporary footy.

If Zlatan goes now, it'll be remembered fondly - he came, he delivered, we won (at least 1) a trophy and he proved that at 35 he could cut it in the PL.

If he stays, I feel he could start to feel like a weight upon the team - particularly if he's basically angling to stay until he's past it (which will obviously come in the next 2 seasons).
 
Devil may care said:
I think experience is highly overrated, Spurs have a set of players that have never won anything and are comfortably ahead of of us in the PL, same goes for Dortmund and Monaco who are thriving in the CL. Experience becomes a crutch when it's married to someone that also has negatvie effects on the team. Ibra is a big character but everything is about him not the team, the rest of our attackers play in subservience to him and I think it's part of the reason we struggle against tightly packed teams, we don't operate as an attacking unit, we operate as a single attacking entity. For all the experience we have done nothing for 4 seasons as regards the league, failing to qualify for the CL twice with a third time being a very distinct possibility, I think it's time we freshened up and stopped looking to the past with stop gaps and start building a team as opposed to a showcase for an individual.
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Interesting points, I do agree with many of the things you said. I still think we have a great chance of CL football next season. Five games in the EL guarantees it and a trophy. We have had a turbulent few years since Fergie, with managers/players/ playstyle. You can say Spurs are comfortably ahead of us but they crumble when it matters, it's all about trophies. I want United competing in the CL like everyone else, progressing a footballing style and stability will bring it but that means time. We need foundations and a spine of players for more than one season. Stop gaps is a bit unfair, you can't just have young players, you need a mix. I wouldn't call Pogba, Bailly, Miki and Zlatan a stop gap. It's getting the balance right and Jose will need another window to do it. In my Zlatan has been great for us, he's scored a ton of goals. Things are not perfect but we can't make loads of changes every summer. Just think you underestimate an experienced leader, we need to show a little patience. Can't ship loads out and brings loads in every season, teams need to time to grow.
 
Morpheus 7 said:
Interesting points, I do agree with many of the things you said. I still think we have a great chance of CL football next season. Five games in the EL guarantees it and a trophy. We have had a turbulent few years since Fergie, with managers/players/ playstyle. You can say Spurs are comfortably ahead of us but they crumble when it matters, it's all about trophies. I want United competing in the CL like everyone else, progressing a footballing style and stability will bring it but that means time. We need foundations and a spine of players for more than one season. Stop gaps is a bit unfair, you can't just have young players, you need a mix. I wouldn't call Pogba, Bailly, Miki and Zlatan a stop gap. It's getting the balance right and Jose will need another window to do it. In my Zlatan has been great for us, he's scored a ton of goals. Things are not perfect but we can't make loads of changes every summer. Just think you underestimate an experienced leader, we need to show a little patience. Can't ship loads out and brings loads in every season, teams need to time to grow.
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I don't see Pogba, Mhki and Bailly a stop gaps, but I do see a 35 year old striker as a stop gap. I don't want a team of kids but I do think we drained the maximum out of Ibra this season and it's still not really gotten us any further forward in the PL, I think we are banking on the EL to scrape into the CL next season. I have nothing against Ibra at all, I think he's added some confidence and personality into this squad, and if he was happy to take on Rooney's role I'd be fine with him staying one more season, but I don't really want to see another 50 game season from a slow 36 year old who neuters the rest of the attack. As for leadership, time for some of these players who are no longer kids to man up and be leaders, leadership isn't predicated on age IMO, the likes of Pogba, Rojo, Herrera and Mhki need to be the leaders now.
 
Are people seriously suggesting that extending his contract isn't the right thing to do? I mean, our biggest problem is scoring goals, and Zlatan has scored around 1/3 of our entire goals (and around three times as much as our second leading scorer). What is the solution? Not extend Zlatan's contract.
 
Revan said:
Are people seriously suggesting that extending his contract isn't the right thing to do? I mean, our biggest problem is scoring goals, and Zlatan has scored around 1/3 of our entire goals (and around three times as much as our second leading scorer). What is the solution? Not extend Zlatan's contract.
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I think people have just lost their perspective. It's the denouement of the buzz surrounding a summer where we hired Mourinho, Pogba and Zlatan. Three names, personas and brands that made us forget, for just an instant, that the previous three years happened.

And then the reality sets in, we're truly a work in progress, a restoration of daunting scale. "A sad club". That resonated with me. But I would argue that many a fan will find it easier to blame a certain few players - Ibra because his age and pace is an easy target despite quickly proving his iconic status; Pogba because his glamourous image isn't gritty enough and his youth is easily forgotten after his prominence in a Juve team that could support talent of such precocious nature; Fellaini for his inescapable ties to a managerial blunder of epic proportions despite the player being one of our better performers in the time.

I really do think it's this kind of misplaced expectation. Many of us, myself included probably had a deep lying hope we might win the league this season. That's the turnaround in atmosphere I saw before the season started.

Edit: add the bundesliga port to that list
 
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With the career he's had and his age, I wouldn't blame him to live it up in LA. I'd prefer him to stay, but if he's not set on staying so be it.
 
GBBQ said:
Puts a new spin on this quote from Mourinho
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Huh, so it does. Didn't even think it could be in relation to Zlatan initially. If it happens, it happens. I think he's quite easily one of our best players and the only one who seems to know how to put the ball in the net, but adequately replacing him with a younger model will dent that shortcoming. Easier said than done, of course, but there are names out there.
 
Revan said:
Are people seriously suggesting that extending his contract isn't the right thing to do? I mean, our biggest problem is scoring goals, and Zlatan has scored around 1/3 of our entire goals (and around three times as much as our second leading scorer). What is the solution? Not extend Zlatan's contract.
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Yes zlatan has scored 1/3 of our goals but that is because our football wholly centered around zlatan, most of our best chances fall to zlatan, when he is on the pitch everything seems to revolve around him, so when he fails to score it means utd fail to score. People look at his 26 or so goals and say he has had a brilliant season while forgetting that he has missed most number of big chances in epl this season, among 20 players who have scored 15 or more goals in europe's top 5 league this season zlatan has the second worst conversion rate @ 14.7%. If zlatan actually had a better conversion rate maybe we would have scored more goals and goal scoring won't have been such a problem then.
 
BigCaine said:
Yes zlatan has scored 1/3 of our goals but that is because our football wholly centered around zlatan, most of our best chances fall to zlatan, when he is on the pitch everything seems to revolve around him, so when he fails to score it means utd fail to score. People look at his 26 or so goals and say he has had a brilliant season while forgetting that he has missed most number of big chances in epl this season, among 20 players who have scored 15 or more goals in europe's top 5 league this season zlatan has the second worst conversion rate @ 14.7%. If zlatan actually had a better conversion rate maybe we would have scored more goals and goal scoring won't have been such a problem then.
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That would mean that we'd be even more Zlatan-dependent and our other wingers/strikers/midfielders would still be inept with scoring, so no.
 
The guy who is reporting the story also works for Onda Cero, who are super reliable supposedly.





 
Not exactly surprising if true. We know he likes to move around a lot in general.

Anyway, we should only be relying on him for a year at most. We should not be doing that for next year. It is our problem that we are too relying on him this season and if we have no plan for the next.

Speaking of it, riaola whatever his agent name is known to move his players around a lot. Fergie called him the worst to deal with. And, we have 2 players of his left if/when zlatan goes to deal with later.
 
MaxiPaxi said:
The guy who is reporting the story also works for Onda Cero, who are super reliable supposedly.





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Got a thought. Do they mean that he's agreed to join Galaxy this summer (if it's even true) or just that he will join them whenever he's ready to leave Europe? Maybe in 1 or 2 seasons?
 
Not that bothered if he goes. I know that may sound mental, but our attack needs a massive shakeup and Zlatan going will force our hand.
 
I wouldn't be too sad if he left this season. Our entire attack needs upgrading, not just in terms of personnel, but the style of the attack as well. Having Zlatan makes us attack a certain way, and the size of his personality (and salary) means its hard for him to be a bit part player. Plus he'd be going next summer if he doesnt go this, so it doesnt change our long term plans.

On balance I'd rather he stayed for the sake of the quality of our squad, even it is tricky to use him as bit of a backup, but if he finishes the season well then moves on, well good luck to him.
 
Zlatan's got 1 more year maximum IMO, who knows how he might drop off next year, we need to put our eggs in a younger player's basket (Griezmann + Belotti)

Zlatan will want to be first choice and I don't think we can guarantee that from now.
 
So the weather update wasn't about Griezmann :D.

Hope Zlatan has one more year in him.
 
I hope he stays for another year but if he has agreed to move on then good luck to him. Buzzing to have seen him in a United shirt so I will always be chuffed from that aspect. Love the man :devil:
 
Fire us to the CL by scoring the winner of the EL in your home country and retire from the European leagues big man!

Obviously hope he stays and wished we had him for a few seasons.
 
No issue with this. I'll remember him fondly as a one-season machine who did a great job and displayed great professionalism for the most part. Go enjoy your retirement and Jose, get Woody's wallet open coz we need TWO new strikers now. Giving us three overall, including Rashford.
 
Where's the evidence pointing to Ibrahimovic inhibiting our play? The only thing I see people using to support it is that he scores a lot of goals and our other attackers are playing badly. When he doesn't play they don't seem to play any better so it seems a big leap to make. I think it has more to do with illogical biases towards pace and youth than anything evidence-based.

It's not the end of the world if he leaves but I don't understand why people welcome it.
 
The guy is 35. Feck imagine we signed him years ago, he was made for this league.
 
Brwned said:
Where's the evidence pointing to Ibrahimovic inhibiting our play? The only thing I see people using to support it is that he scores a lot of goals and our other attackers are playing badly. When he doesn't play they don't seem to play any better so it seems a big leap to make. I think it has more to do with illogical biases towards pace and youth than anything evidence-based.

It's not the end of the world if he leaves but I don't understand why people welcome it.
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I agree. Ibra may have missed chances but other attacking players have also had plenty of missed chances too. Add Pogba to that list too.

Ie: our play has produced chances for plenty of players, its because of our pathetic finishing that it seems as though Ibrahimovich dominates.
 
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I don't think for a second Jose was referring to Zlatan when he spoke of chilling in LA. Zlatan is probably the only super driven player we've got in our squad (well, Tony perhaps). I'd be surprised if a deal has been done. If it has been, I suspect it has more to do with Jose having decided that he needs a top level striker this summer meaning that Zlatan would not be an automatic starter.
 
Womp said:
The guy is 35. Feck imagine we signed him years ago, he was made for this league.
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Yup. Even at 35 the team is so much more intimidating than the last several. Heck, If we had been just a bit more mature as a team and put away some of these matches we wound up drawing in which we dominated we might even be fancying the title now. Would have loved if we let Rooney go when he first asked and got younger Ibra
 
He's gone and I can't blame him.

He came hear because he believed Mou that we will be able to competet for the PL. Now he has realised that we aren't and won't in the next 2-3 years so who could blame him for going to L.A.

I also think it's the best for us, too.
 
Brwned said:
Where's the evidence pointing to Ibrahimovic inhibiting our play? The only thing I see people using to support it is that he scores a lot of goals and our other attackers are playing badly. When he doesn't play they don't seem to play any better so it seems a big leap to make. I think it has more to do with illogical biases towards pace and youth than anything evidence-based.
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Yeah, at first I thought the same, but with our shortcomings since the turn of the year I absolutely side now more to Zlatan performing well in spite of our general tepidity rather than the root cause of it.
 
Have no issues if he leaves this summer. He'd only have 1 more year after which is not guaranteed to deliver similar results, so anyway needs urgent replacement.

I think he is entitled to expect he starts every game, yet that is something Mourinho cant promise him next season.

There are plenty of reliable and talented strikers out there right now, albeit they will cost a lot of money, so he is also replaceable.
 
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I don't understand why he would rather go to LA galaxy, really disappointing if true
 
Attila said:
I don't understand why he would rather go to LA galaxy, really disappointing if true
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Perhaps we won't give him the length of contract he wants, mate.
 
Attila said:
I don't understand why he would rather go to LA galaxy, really disappointing if true
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Me neither, I had doubts wether he would perform in the PL but given how good he's been, I don't see why he would want to leave when he's still able to compete at top level. He said himself that he will leave when he feels he can't compete anymore.
 
sammsky1 said:
Have no issues if he lives this summer. He'd only have 1 more year after which is not guaranteed to deliver similar results, so anyway needs urgent replacement.

I think he is entitled to expect he starts every game, yet that is something Mourinho cant promise him next season.

There are plenty of reliable and talented strikers out there right now, albeit they will cost a lot of money, so he is also replaceable.
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Aw, that's so nice of you. :p
 
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