Mourinho is cool

Zlatan Ibrahimovic: ‘Mourinho is cool – the older coaches get, the cooler they get’

• Hello. I am Zlatan," announces Zlatan Ibrahimovic, Sweden’s greatest footballer – and author of the bestselling memoir I Am Zlatan. Then he sits down and finishes the wrap he is eating.

We’re upstairs in the Théâtre Trévise in Paris in early May. Ibrahimovic has called the city home since signing for Paris Saint-Germain from AC Milan in 2012. The next day, he will announce, in typically bombastic style, that he is leaving the club ("I came like a king, left like a legend"). Huge news, really – but today he’s here to talk about a new line of sportswear he has designed, light relief from the summer’s non-stop transfer chatter.

Ibrahimovic’s career has taken him to many of the world’s most famous football clubs – including Ajax, Juventus, Internazionale, Barcelona, AC Milan and PSG – at one point making him the sport’s most expensive player in total transfer fees (he has since been pipped to that accolade by former teammate Ángel Di María). Soon, if the reports are correct, he will add Manchester United to the list.

Having spent so much time in two of Europe’s style capitals, perhaps it’s unsurprising that he’s moving into fashion. His range, called A-Z, is tasteful and – importantly – cheapish (about €39, or £31, for a top). If you’re thinking monochrome tracksuits with "ZLATAN" printed down the leg, think again. The collection comprises low-key, hyper-normal sportswear – an edifying concept, given the way fashion has doggedly co-opted sportswear in the past few years. The idea, he explains, is for it to be affordable in a way that sportswear wasn’t when Ibrahimovic was a second-generation immigrant teenager playing football in the 90s in Rosengård, a tough, multi-ethnic district of Malmö. "The clothes are basic," he says with a smile. "They are for everyone of every background. You know, like mine. I will never forget where I came from, and I don’t forget the people I’ve met on the way."

Ibrahimovic grew up in Rosengård with his Bosnian Muslim father and Croatian Catholic mother. "The first time I went into the city, I was 17. I didn’t know outside the area. I always wore hand-me-downs. It was cool, though; for me, it [Rosengård] was paradise, because it was all I knew." As a teenager, he started playing for Malmö, before heading off – in 2001, at the age of 19 – on his grand tour of Europe. "When you go back [to Rosengård, now subsumed into a new district]," he says, "you still see people in training clothes. There are no suits."

Now 34, Ibrahimovic’s rags-to-riches story makes this a fairly risk-free venture: first, people will buy the range because it’s by Zlatan; second, as he says: "Even if I stop playing now, I will have food to eat – and I will have food to eat for ever. I don’t do this for the economy."

Still, footballers and fashion... it’s a problematic marriage. Consider Cristiano Ronaldo and his catastrophic CR7 line. "When we talk about fashion, the only one is Beckham," he says. "The rest? You leave them. These people, they see the doll in the window and they buy the exact clothes of the doll and walk out the shop and they think: I am fashion." He leans forward. "I don’t follow fashion. If I like it, I buy it. I don’t think about what shirt goes with [what] pants. To me, you are football or you are fashion. Either you do it 100% or 200%. Not 10%. You don’t need to pretend to be perfect."

This is typical Ibrahimovic. He describes his career in quotable hyperbole, phrases affectionately known as Zlatanisms – "a World Cup without me isn’t worth watching", things like that. And with cause, you could say. The Guardian’s Barney Ronay described him as "a player capable of moments of skill and physical dexterity beyond the reach of pretty much anyone else on the planet". He’s a genius and a maniac; random, acrobatic and spectacular. Nothing followed by nothing... then the impossible: dribbling around six defenders to score (at Ajax) or the famous bicycle kick against England three years ago. When he plays, he’s a vision and a villain. In person, however, he’s open and smiling. When talking about "fashion", he’s even a little nervous. "I am absolutely not perfect, I will still do mistakes." I haven’t seen you make mistakes, I say. "Listen. Tiger Woods pretended to be perfect. And what happened? We learn from mistakes. I am realistic – and I have always said this." He pauses. "But only I decide if it is a mistake." He bursts

The Zlatanisms are there (he talks about himself in the third person with complete sincerity), but it soon becomes clear they are for my benefit – he waits to be goaded and delivers them with deep, Swedish irony. He says the absurd (everything is 200% or above) and he periodically slips into motivational chat: "I want to take over. I want to take the challenge and be No 1. I don’t give up." But every Zlatanism is postscripted with his familiar grin, sometimes a cackle. He giggles like a drunk fox. It’s infectious.

Does he agree that the most stylish people in football are often the ones not on the pitch? "Managers are more elegant," he says. "That is right for a coach. He has responsibility, he has to be a leader." And who have been his leaders? "I like [former PSG boss Carlo] Ancelotti. [José] Mourinho [his old boss at Inter, and possibly his new one at Manchester United] is cool. The older they get, the cooler they get. The grey hair. The serious expression. I have a good relationship with all of them." All? "Except one." Pep? "Exactly." He has previously said that, when he was at Barcelona, the then-manager Pep Guardiola (soon of Manchester City) made him feel like an "alien". Today, though, he seems more meditative on the subject. He shrugs at his name: "I don’t need negative energy."

Next Monday, just before 5pm, Ibrahimovic will lead out his nation for their first game of Euro 2016, against Ireland, and his 114th cap. He hasn’t lived in the country permanently since his teens, but he still has a home in Sweden. "I do feel Swedish, even though I don’t live there now," he says. "I still try to represent Sweden." Is he a hero there? "I don’t know," he shrugs. "I am good at what I do. I guess I am the new Sweden, the new generation, because of all these new backgrounds. I am proud of what we have done, and the immigrants who are stabilising in Sweden." What is it like, being the face of Swedish multiculturalism? "I believe I opened many doors for people in the same situation, and I stand for it. It was not easy. I needed to break through many walls to get here."

He’s reserved when talking about other footballers, except David Beckham. "Beckham is a cool guy. I look up to him. It is not easy to be him. He has a family, but outside he is a machine." Ibrahimovic is married to a Swedish woman; they have two sons. "I keep them outside of all this. I don’t want them to live my life. My boys will not live in my shadow. They will become better than me." Do they play? "They train. But I judge hard. I care about discipline and respect. They need to learn the principles." He breaks character: "I just hope they become two ninjas."

Ibrahimovic’s relationship with his parents has been well documented. They divorced, and, while he spent time with his mum and his dad, he spent more time with his father. "My father was hard to me. He had to work a lot. He was not there every day, taking me training, because he was bringing food to the table. That is the Balkan mentality. They came before the war, not as fugitives, but the economy was not good. I took myself to school, to sport." It was an instructive start. "I didn’t ask for help. Your confidence grows like this. Where I come from, you don’t ask, you take." He also became a dab hand at stealing bicycles as a teenager. "I mean – no one asks for a photo [when he returns to Malmö], they just take it. They don’t ask for respect, they just take it. It’s rough."

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