Ibrahimovic statements on women’s football
- are they as bad as they seem or were they corrupted by media?
Sweden and PSG forward Zlatan Ibrahimovic has caused quite the controversy the last few days, both in Sweden and in other countries, after being quoted as saying “I got a question over the summer who is the best, myself or Lotta Schelin. You’re joking with me, right?“ and that “When I go to Europe they compare me with Messi and Ronaldo. When I come home they compare me with a women’s player. Should I have to be ashamed of being a Swedish football player?”.
The statements have rightly been criticized, and I was myself bothered by his words. However, after taking Ibrahimovic’s own advice today and reading the interview as a whole, and not just reprinted extracts, I believe that the situation has been corrupted. Ibrahimovic does not in fact seem to intend to insult Lotta Schelin, the Swedish women’s national team or women’s football as a whole, and if you will bare with me I am going to explain why.
In the interview, Ibrahimovic talks about the unfairness that he feels that recently retired men’s national team player Anders Svensson has suffered the last couple of months. At the Swedish Football Awards this year, Svensson was given a car by the Swedish Football Federation for being the most capped male player of all time. Many reacted badly to this as Therese Sjögran, the woman with the most caps, was not given anything. What Ibrahimovic really feels that she deserves is unknown (although he did make a bad joke and say that he can give her a bike, referring to another part of the recent debate about the fact that the women’s national team does not bring in any money, but rather spends what the men’s national team makes), but in the recent interview in Expressen he only spoke about women’s football because he felt that Svensson’s achievement has been diminished as all of the talk has been about how unfair the situation was. He says “a black shadow has been cast on all of what he has done because of a car!”.
Ibrahimovic continues to say that “With all respect for what the women do, they have done it fantastically well, but you cannot compare men’s football with women’s football. Quit it, it’s not even funny.” The journalist adds that the women footballers often say themselves that one should not compare, and Ibrahimovic quickly says “Yes, but who is it that is comparing? Is it the women or the media? In my case it is the media (…) I got a question over the summer who is the best, myself or Lotta Schelin. You’re joking with me, right?”
At first glance, Ibrahimovic may seem to be insulting Schelin, but if one looks at the conversation as a whole, it is quite obvious that he is talking about the media. It is a joke that Swedish media is constantly trying to compare him with Lotta Schelin, when women’s and men’s football should not be compared. It is not a joke because Schelin is not every bit as good within her section of the sport as he is.
Today, Ibrahimovic has defended his own statements, saying exactly that – his criticism was directed towards the media, and not towards women’s football. He also says that “The bike was a joke, a bad one, between myself and the journalist, and I assumed that he understood that it was a joke. In print it was not quite as funny. It was not my intent to step on anyone’s toes.” and “Women’s football has my full respect and they have delivered fantastic results. I have not in any way badmouthed the women’s national team. If anyone is saying anything else, please read the interview in full.”
As I said above, I took his advice and read the interview, and I can now understand why he said most of what he did. Some of his statements were still inappropriate and badly thought through, and some of it is still insulting, but the core appears to be that he wants the media to stop comparing the women with the men, which is what both the women’s players, myself and most women’s football fans want, is it not? One can wonder why he is so upset about “cargate” as it has been called for seemingly the wrong reasons - he should be as upset as everyone else that Sjögran was not acknowledged - but apart from that aspect, were his statements as insulting as they first appeared, or does he have a badly expressed point? What do you think?
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