Zlatan was born on October 3, 1981 in Malmo and the son of emigrant parents (Bosnia and Yugoslavia).
Zlatan was always a rebellious son in his childhood but soon became a football fan.
After her parents' divorce, he lived in Sefik with her father but spent a good part of her day in a futon field near her mother's house.
At 6 he won his first pair of cleats.
Zlatan started playing at the age of 10 on a team in the neighborhood where he lived with his father.
At 13 he moved to Malmo, the biggest club in the city. However, due to his personality, which was not easy for the coaches, he ended up making him leave Malmo to play for FBK Balkan and at the same time start working in the port to help with family finances.
At the age of 15, Zlatan almost stopped playing football to be able to work full time in the port but the coach who had initially hired him for Malmo met him and convinced him not to stop playing, because for him Zlatan had everything to become one of the best players in Sweden.
After this conversation, Zlatan returns to Malmo and Student video with his focus on this without having to work.
In studies things did not go well but in football he started to arouse the interest of international clubs without even wanting to have played in the Malmo main team.
As he missed school, he ended up taking the time to study players like Ronaldo, Van Basten and Grabiel Batistuta.
His admiration for Ronaldo was so great that in his room there were posters fixed by the Brazilian player.
When Zlatan joined the Malmo main team he was already known but not only for his football, as he had missed more than 350 hours of classes at school.
This made the president, coach and several experienced players of the team talk to him and encourage him to make an effort also in his studies and in his life beyond football.
In one of Malmo's friendly matches he was observed by Arsène Wagner, Arsenal's coach, and was invited to join the club.
However when they learned that to be definitively hired by Arsenal he would have to do tests they refused saying:
Zlatan does not test
This meant that he did not go to Arsenal having stayed in Malmo in his first season in the main squad but ended up being a reserve the entire season.
Ending up just making his debut in the last game of the championship (this time Malmo came down from division).
It was in the 2nd division that Zlatan asserted himself as a starter and with each game he was playing several proposals from clubs arrived to sign him, but the president refused them justifying himself with what happened to Arsenal.
At the end of this season Ajax appeared trying to sign Zlatan.
This time the club ended up giving in to the will of the player who wanted to go to the club that launched Marcos Van Basten (one of his idols).
At the time Ajax paid 9 million euros making Zlatan the most expensive Swedish player in history.
He arrived at Ajax as a starter and wearing shirt 9, but the start was quite difficult, as he was not able to demonstrate the unemployment he had in training during games.
This, plus his explosive temperament, made fans start to doubt his talent.
Ending up going to Ajax reserves.
In one of the games for the reserve team against Groningen fc ended up hitting an opponent with an elbow and caught 5 punishment games.
His first season at Ajax was a fiasco making the Swedish press call him "the most overrated player in the world".
Since then, the relationship between Zlatan and the Swedish press has been very bad.
Despite having a bad season, he started being called up for the Sweden national team as a reserve for the 2002 World Cup.
After the Worlds, things started to go better at Ajax where he started to demonstrate his true value after he stopped being an individualist (something that was already pointed out in Malmo).
He ended up scoring 48 goals in 110 games and winning twice the Eredivisie (2001-2002 and 2003-2004), a Dutch Cup (2001-2002) and a Dutch Super Cup (2002).
After Euro 2004 he was signed by Juventus at the request of Fabio Capello for 19 million euros.
He arrived at Juventus to be a reserve for Del Piero and -Trezeguet but due to a trezeguet injury he ended up starting to play and become one of the undisputed players having even won the title of the league's top scorer and elected the best player in the league.
At the end of this season, Juventus turned down a € 40 million proposal from Real Madrid for Zlatan.
In the following season, due to problems between him and Fabio Capello, he ended up staying longer in the reserve team than in the first team, ending up seeing Juventus lose both titles won due to the Calciopolli scandal and being relegated to Serie B.
Due to problems with the coach Zlatan asked to be negotiated and almost went to AC Milan but in the last moments Inter d eMilan appeared who hired him for 25 million euros.
This created a revolt among Juventus cyst supporters that Inter won the Juventus titles due to the scandal.
In the first season at Inter he had a lot of difficulties, but alongside Adriano "the Emperor" they built a pair of hellish attacks. In the following titles 2007-2008 and 2008-2009 Zlatan led the team.
In 2009, Barcelona made a proposal for 69 million euros and ended up hiring Zlatan.
He arrived in Barcelona like an idol and despite having scored 25 goals in the first season he had several problems with Pep Guardiola.
From the moment that Guardiola changed the tactical system and the way of playing Zlatan he was never able to fit in the team and ended up being placed on the bench.
Due to the bad climate between Zlatan and Guardiola, Barceloa decided to loan Zlatan to AC Milan with a purchase option for 25 million euros.
Zlatan had a huge season being the cornerstone for this year's title. This meant that Milan ended up activating the purchase option.
In the second season Zlatan scored 35 goals in 44 games and ended up being the top scorer in the league but not enough to be champion.
In 2012 PSG hired Zlatan for € 20 million to lead a new club project.
When he arrived in Paris he was asked if he knew the players of the French championship and his answer was:
I don't know most of the French league players but I'm sure they all know me
In his first season, irritated by the criticism from fans, even after scoring 18 goals in 16 games, he said:
I don't understand the PSG fans being so demanding. Before I arrived they won nothing.
Despite things going well at PSG Zlatan was never able to take Sweden to a World Championship again by staying fit in 2010 and 2014.
When his contract with PSG was nearing its end, he asked when he was asked about the renewal, replied:
If they exchange the Eiffel Tower for a statue of me, I stay at PSG.
Leaving PSG after 4 seasons in which he won many titles and scored 156 goals.
In 2016, after Sweden was eliminated by Belgium in the European Zlatan decided to retire from the national team as the best scorer in history with 62 goals scored.
The following season, Zlatan went to Manchester United to make him fulfill his desire to represent a Premier League club.
Manchester United idol Eic Cantona welcomed Zlatan:
Welcome to Manchester United but there is only one king in Manchester
Zlatan quando soube destas palavras respondeu:
I will never be the king of Manchester I will be GOD
In his debut he started scoring goals as in all his previous debuts in the main leagues. His first international title was won at that time the Europa League.
In the second season he had more than 7 months stopped recovering from an injury causing the player and the club to reach an agreement to end the contract at the end of the same.
Zlatan ends up moving to the USA to represent the LA Galaxy.
In his debut in the USA he started by scoring a great goal and this season he reached the 500 goal mark in his career.
Due to the excellent time he was going through the LA Galaxy it started to be said that Real Madrid and AC Milan were interested in hiring him to be a reference in the team.
Zlatan ended up signing for AC Milan where he has scored 22 goals in 30 games.
Zlatan has a career marked by great goals, controversies, strong phrases, self-centeredness that has won football lovers from all over the world.
Although he never won a Champions League or a national team competition, he certainly left his mark in football history.
