Ibra is always a relatively great league player, because leagues generally are never won nor lost on the basis of "big games." Within that context, Ibra is a giant. Outside of that context, however, Ibra has consistently failed with several big teams: Juventus, Inter, Barcelona, AC Milan, and PSG (which became a relative 'big team' when Ibra was still a part of the team). And he failed, and not just a little bit, but quite hard...
Frank lampard also did (ie have 20 goals in 10 consecutive seasons) albeit not in 4 different leagues. IMO lampards achievement is definitely more significant considering he scored all those goals playing in a deeper role (ie attacking midfielder)
At league level I completely disagree that he hasn't appeared in Big games His scoring record in Milan derbies (for both teams) is pretty solid.in fact his tally isn't that far of shevchenco's overall record tally He scored a golazo against real Madrid in 09/10 el classico I'm pretty sure if we done a breakdown of his league goals a significant portion of his tally would've come in matches that actually matter
What? Lampard has five 20+ goals/seasons, and he was the main PK taker. According to transfermarkt, Lampard scored 60 goals from the spot, which made him one of the finest. I agree though, Lampard is a bit underrated, especially compared to Gerrard. He's always rated lower.
Yes you are correct it seems In addition to his 5 consecutive seasons with 20+ goals he had with 19 and another with 17 which is still pretty remarkable
I concur though with the players around him at Chelsea it's no wonder. Gerrard had a few seasons where he was scoring a ton and he def had players of lesser skill then what Lampard had.
Gerrard only scored plenty of goals when he had good players around him as well, like Alonso and Mascherano.
AC Milan has not really been a top team ever since 2008-09, if not since 2007-08. And Inter Milan declined heavily, quickly after their treble win in 2010. How many goals did Ibrahimovic scored against pre-2009 AC Milan? How many goals did Ibra scored against pre-2011 Inter Milan? Ibrahimovic, for the most part, rarely ever played against strong Milan teams. When Inter Milan was stronger than AC Milan: Ibra played for Inter. When AC Milan was stronger than Inter: Ibra played for AC Milan. In conclusion: Ibra being good in the Milan derby when he more or less always played against relatively weak and/or inferior Milan teams, does not really serves as an argument by which to refute the consensus opinion that Ibra routinely disappoints against the top tier clubs. One great goal against Real Madrid 2009-10 does not deny nor refute his 20 other failures against top teams. And again: Real Madrid 2009-10 was the same team that could not even advance past the Round of 16 at the Champions League. League goals in a significant portion of matches that actually matter, are rarely ever goals against the big teams. Leagues are rarely ever won in single matches against big teams like Real Madrid or Barcelona. La Liga, for example, has never really been decided by Barcelona vs. Real Madrid games. I fully expect you to respond by saying that Ronaldo scored a decisive Liga goal in the 2011-12 Clasico, but that Clasico did not decided the league at all: the Clasico results of season 2011-12 are more or less the same as the Clasico results of every other season i.e. La Liga is rarely or never decided by the Clasico. And that's precisely what makes Ibrahimovic such a remarkable player at league level: his ability to make a difference against inferior opponents is very consistent throughout a long league season - which is precisely the type of thing that wins you league titles. Ibrahimovic's strengths are arguably better suited for the league format, compared to Zidane's relative inconsistency in the league format. Why else do you think that Zidane, a supposed big game player, never was actually good at leagues? Juventus won more leagues without him, before him and also after him. Real Madrid won 2 consecutive leagues right after Zidane's retirement, and Madrid also won the 2000-01 Liga right before Zidane was signed: in 5 seasons with Zidane, only one league title. With Ibrahimovic we see arguably the opposite: a relatively great league player in every league he played at (albeit he wasn't great in La Liga, to be honest - and he's merely good, not great, in the English Premier League), who consistently goes missing in the big cup games. Leagues are rarely ever decided by big games against big teams. On the other hand, cups are increasingly decided by big games against big teams.
Well, while you might have a point, or not. You don't give any actual information that supports your claims.
Look everybody: Another club that somehow gets better results without Ibra. It has happened with Inter, Barcelona, and now PSG. Unbelievable: the best result in PSG's history, and it happens in literally the first Ibra-less season, after 4-5 years of Ibra getting an almost luxurious 'creative license' at the club.
Only in the UCL though. We've already established Ibra's credentials as an amazing league player. He's arguably already Man Utd's best player in the EPL, and PSG isn't doing as well in the league this year.
Cavani has some really good scoring stats but damn he seems to miss 3 or 4 good chances a game. And he had a respectable scoring rate of like 53 goals in 97 league matches despite playing as a winger But you're def right. PSG are def missing Zlatan
Probably shouldn't call him a winger. It gives the wrong impression about the role he plays. There are games where he does look like the most wasteful top-level striker in the world though: https://streamable.com/zkny https://streamable.com/mfmk
you're right. PSG played him as a winger mostly which annoyed him. He had an amazing goalscoring rate at Napoli and arguably world class.
PSG are trailing In 2nd place in Ligue 1 behind Monaco With Ibrahimovic they won the league comfortably for 4 consecutive seasons Unless PSG end up winning the champions league this year I fail to see how PSG beating Barcelona can be linked to zlatans departure from the club (And what makes you think that if PSG can thrash Barcelona 4-0 at home that they can't return the favor in the nou camp) the tie IMO is far from dead.if MSN Click no defence in Europe/world can contain them. As a self confessed Barcelona fan you should know this better than anyone
http://forums.bigsoccer.com/threads/the-unsubstantiated-myths-of-football-thread.2039088/ Ok mate. My data will be available via the link above. Please let me know how and why my conclusion or argument is incorrect. Regards,
9 pages later on this thread and nobody has even mentioned how ibrahimovics goalscoring increased significantly from his playing time in Italy to his time for psg ibra left Italy at 29 years old(in the autumn of most strikers careers) and in 10+ seasons playing for some of the biggest sides in Europe could never even score 30 goals in a single season(all comps)..not even once in psg he miraculously became a 35-50 goal a season player now call me sceptical but how does a ST move to a completely different league in his 30s and start racking up huge numbers when he never showed any signs of being such a prolific goalscorer for the vast majority of his playing career note don't forget serie a wasn't exactly a elite league for the majority of time ibra was plying his trade there take di natale who was the third most prolific league scorer in Europe from 2010-2012 playing for a completely average udinese side...but again just how did di natale become such a prolific scorer post calciopoli in his 30s aswell when he literally couldn't even buy a goal when serie a was genuinely a good league ie up until probably 05/06
Your obsession with players scoring 30-50 goals a season has been central to your discussions about forwards ever since you started posting on this forum. Many serious posters have already presented valid and self evident factors explaining this phenomenon e.g. variables affecting a players scoring capacity in different clubs/leagues, sudden decline or increase in scoring after changing clubs/leagues etc. And yet, still, you keep on ignoring these variables in your arguments by not mentioning the differences between different eras, differences between league styles, team configurations, quality of players in support of the main goalscorers/forwards in a team, improvement and modernization of the game in general, and other variables effecting this rare 30-50 goals phenomenon that we see in a few forwards now and then in football history. Replace CR7 in this very same R.Madrid with any other (you name it) prolific historical forward who used to score 25-30 goals a season in a competitive European league (and in different eras) and there is a strong case for them to be scoring as well 30-50 goals in multiple seasons for a prolonged period of time in this present football environment. This is very likely the case. At least the way I see it. CR7 has always been a prolific scorer, but this Madrid team who has its "balls against the wall" for CR7, inevitably has helped so far his 30-50 goals in multiple seasons, a lot. Could be argued that the same case could apply to Messi or, for that matter, any other prolific forward that ever graced the pitch. After all, it is a team sport and no forward would score without the support of others on pitch. The greater the support the better the scoring. Some teams concentrate all their tactics and team configuration to booster a particular forward in scoring. Madrid comes to mind. Other teams do not rely on this strategy. In any case, lacking 30-50 goals in multiple seasons does not make such a forward like Ibrahimovic inferior a striker relative to any other forward who're known for pulling off 30-50 goals in multiple seasons. For if you insist other wise that it does, than you ought to be very shallow minded [no offense here]. @ko242 @leadleader @celito @giles varley @Guigs
are mentally deranged dude my argument hasn't been about strikers scoring 35-50 goals a season but rather why has ibrahimovics goalscoring become so inflated since he moved to france. why were strikers like eto and even Edison cavani able to have multiple 30+ goals seasons while playing in Italy playing for similar or lesser teams than ibrahimovic. in Italy he was merely a striker with great technique but could only boast one goal every other game like so make other strikers playing today ie kane,lukaku,aguero I never denied ibrahimovic has more to his game than goals even in italy(compared to a limited striker like harry kane or diego costa for example)all I am arguing is his goalscoring has been hugely inflated playing in a very weak French league(compared to the other 4 European major leagues)with a very low coefficient ranking and this explains perfectly why his goalscoring in the champions against so big teams has been relatively mediocre (just look at cavani this season after being made the focal point of psgs attack he is scoring at the rate of 1 goal a game and people were starting to doubt if he was even that good since hes been in france completely ignoring that has been played out of position to cater to ibrahimovics ego)
1. 50+ goals (Can others replicate CR7 and Messi?) To be honest, i do agree that context must be considered when discussing forward players and statistics, @greatstriker11 , and you can't rank players solely based on that. otherwise, we wouldn't have to watch football and we go to wikipedia and judge and rate players based on statistics. However, i think what Messi and Cr7 have done can only be matched by very few in history if any, for so many years. 1st of all, i think it's safe to say that many players have 2 or 3 good seasons and then fall off for whatever reason. Messi and Cr7 have not fallen off practically since they began their careers! which is insane (taking performances and/or goals into consideration, they have always been relevant!)!!! and ibrahimovic was also the focal point of every team he played for except barcelona. and sepaking of service, psg has had excellent players, and let's not forget that the french league is without doubt an inferior league compared to what spanish teams have done in champions league and in europa league the past few years. and when Cr7 played in england, english teams were doing very well in europe. so if Messi and Cr7 blew the charts with goal scoring how come ibrahimovic could not do the same in a similar situation?? i don't know where @carlito86 was debating but in this case i would agree with him more on this side. and honestly, although ibrahimovic is a very good striker, no way i would consider him the best of the best. i put gerd müller, eusebio, puskas, lewandowski, suarez, and other strikers in a class above him because he (ibrahimovic) has never been a player to show up on the big occassions. this is exactly where i see aguero, a player who does very well in league play over the years, but doesn't make a dent at national team level or champions league level. and this has very little to do with the team you play on, even though aguero and ibrahimovic where playing on good enough teams to at least have a great showing on the big stage at least a couple of times. for example, a player can still be on an inferior team and still perform great unless he is on a side like mälmo for example.
don't forget agueros hattrick against a dominant Bayern side( albeit in the cl groupstages) the title winning goal in 2010/11..but I agree taking his career as a whole has been rather underwhelming particularly in the cl and even moreso at international level where he has arguably been as bad as gonzalo higuan(who has taken all the flak and criticism from messi die hard fans) lewandowski really doesn't deserve to be mentioned anywhere near gerd muller (don't forget this Bayern side over the last half decade has been the third highest free scoring team in all of Europe and lewandowski has only hit 30 league goals once compared to mullers multiple 30+ league goal seasons there is also a huge gulf in difference between their impact on big matches lewandowski has his 4 goals in the 12/13 cl semi and that's pretty much it while muller is probably the greatest big game goalscorer that ever lived ie scored goals in the world cup final,euro final,champions league final,cl semi final,world cup semi final etc imo ibrahimovic is one the most technically gifted players of the last 20 or so years but as a pure goalscorer I am less than convinced(as proven by his just above average goalscoring till he was 30 years which miracuosly increased by more than 30% in france and of course his lack of goals in big European matches) for me its 1.)gerd muller 2.)suarez 3.)ibrahimovic 4)lewandowski 5)aguero