It’s been nearly eight years since Ronaldo scored the final goal from open play of his career — a right-footed effort from 20 yards out that was assisted by Roberto Carlos as the two Brazilian legends wound down their careers together at Corinthians.
Zlatan Ibrahimovic is confident. You may not have known this, but it is true. He thinks very highly of himself, that Zlatan. So it comes as no surprise that the Zlatan Jimmy Kimmel appearance celebrating the Swede's move to Los Angeles and subsequent heroics in El Trafico involved quite a lot of Zlatan saying things like "I put Sweden on the map" and "I know there are a lot of earthquakes in Los Angeles. This one was me stepping in Los Angeles."
Zlatan Ibrahimovic did it again. In his first MLS start, the big Swede scored the only goal in a 1-0 victory for the LA Galaxy over Bastian Schweinsteiger and the Chicago Fire on Saturday in the Windy City.
Zlatan scored in first-half stoppage time, using his head again to nod home a cross from Ashley Cole for the game’s only goal.
Cole Zlatan #CHIvLA
In the four months since LAFC selected Tyler Miller with the first overall pick in the 2017 MLS expansion draft, he has rubbed shoulders with Will Ferrell, debuted with a clean sheet against his former team in Seattle and come face-to-face with the newly-elected mayor of Los Angeles, Zlatan.
So some giant Swede came to America last week and showed everyone how to do the soccer. Needless to say, people went nuts. Zlatan Ibrahimovic made his debut for the LA Galaxy over the weekend and made an immediate impact. Of course he did. The Zlatan debut goals had sports fans of all types absolutely buzzing Saturday afternoon.
We apologize Zlatan. For several moments there – specifically, the first 26 moments of Saturday's LA derby – we doubted you. It really wasn't fair, as you were sitting on the bench, patiently waiting and watching as Carlos Vela netted two amazing goals to put LAFC up and seemingly out of reach.
In the run up to the first-ever "El Tráfico" – tha name fans have given the MLS derby between LA Galaxy and LAFC – the media hype focused on the Galaxy's recent acquisition of Zlatan Ibrahimovic. Certainly Zlatan did little to dissuade the attention, quipping at a press conference that it feels good to be better than the four billion, or so, other footballers in the world.
Zlatan Ibrahimovic arrived in Los Angeles last week and has wasted no time in reaching peak levels of Zlatanocity.
To start, there was the full-page, five-word ad he took out in the LA Times to announce his arrival. Then there was his first training session with the club, during which he had to be dragged away from shooting practice so that he might remain fresh for this Saturday's LA derby.