If you do not learn from history, Zlatan Ibrahimovic will force you to repeat it: How Milan and their ageless talisman became unlikely title contenders

 

10 years ago, AC Milan signed Zlatan Ibrahimovic, rescuing the 29-year-old from a fraught, unhappy period at Barcelona and immediately cemented themselves as title contenders in a Serie A that had groaned under the weight of a suffocating dynasty enjoyed by cross-city rivals Inter. 

Inter had recently replaced Jose Mourinho with Rafa Benitez, and the Nerazzurri were struggling to adapt to a new era defined by the declining prowess of some of the foundational pieces that had won the treble the season before and had until then, a historic vice grip on the peninsula's premier league. 

The arrival of Zlatan, partnering him with a quiet, thoughtful and tactically astute coach in Massimiliano Allegri, a tight defence and workhorse midfield, coalesced around the skills of their transcendent Swede and brought Il Diavolo's first title in seven years. It was a watershed moment for Italian football, breaking up a half-decade of dominance and re-affirming that the Serie A power pendulum mirrors every swing of the mercurial forward's boot. Gazetta dello Sport wrote the next day, 'Serie A is a league in which 20 teams compete and in the end, Zlatan Ibrahimovic wins.' 

That period was an entire decade ago and for Milan, it was three ownerships, eight coaches and countless crises ago. It has been a tumultuous period since those heady days that brought Ibrahimovic and a Scudetto to Rossoneri hands but unbelievably, against all notions of logic, all pre-conceived rules of time and any hitherto accepted truths about a player's declining athletic ability after a certain age, Zlatan Ibrahimovic is back in a Milan shirt and has turned his team into unlikely Scudetto candidates again. 

The parallels do not end with the 39-year-old's mere reappearance. This time, a decade on from ending the black-and-blue stranglehold on Serie A in the late-aughts, Italian football had surrendered to a seemingly omnipotent champion in Juventus; a Bianconceri side that had adopted the role of schoolyard bully for nine successive seasons, turning a previously competitive league into a 19-team battle for second place. 

However, in similar fashion to the post-Jose Inter, Juventus are displaying chinks in previously impenetrable amour. Like Inter, Juve replaced an out-going figure of consistency and European success in Massimiliano Allegri (remember him?) with a much more inexperienced one in first Maurizio Sarri and now a completely inexperienced one in Andrea Pirlo (think Benitez/Leonardo at Inter). 

Like Inter in 2010, Juventus's foundational pieces are not as strong as in previous seasons. As deep and well-funded the current squad is, the league champions over-reliance on Cristiano Ronaldo, inconsistent performances from star Paolo Dybala and striker Alvaro Morata, ageing/declining/injury prone defenders in Leo Bonucci and Giorgio Chiellini and the now five year absence of a dominant midfield presence means the usually sealed shut window on title contention is ever so slightly open, even if just a sliver. 

Meanwhile, at Via Turati, Milan are playing with an abundance and confidence not seen since a raised eyebrow was the leading facial expression patrolling San Siro's touchline. Once again, a side has been built around the strengths of their imposing forward - surrounding Ibra with pacey and hard-working wingers such as Alexis Saelemakers, Rafael Leao, Sami Castillejo and new signings Jens Petter Hauge and the exciting Brahim Diaz offering offensive incision and regularly stretching opposition defences. 

In Stefano Pioli's 4-2-3-1, the combination of Ismael Bennacer and Franck Kessie is at the moment the best midfield partnership in Italy, the former's passing range complimenting the latter's bulldozing runs and physicality. Simon Kjaer and the revitalised Davide Calabria have helped steady a defence that has survived a shaky return to fitness from captain Alessio Romagnoli and even has an attacking capacity shown by hardworking engine Theo Hernandez. 

Under Pioli, a coach who has seemingly found his calling at Milan, is a teacher and tactician getting defensive solidity and attacking fluidity from a side that for years had displayed very little of either prior to his arrival. Milan additionally seem to have depth of quality where previously there had been no quality at all, able to rotate Diogo Dalot, Sandro Tonali and Ante Rebic alongside the aforementioned quadrant of widemen. 

At the centre of it all is Ibrahimovic, a man who has powered his former and current club to 24 consecutive matches in Serie A without loss and having contributed to 23 goals in that time (17 goals, 6 assists) at the age of 39, a frankly astonishing feat that further establishes Zlatan as one of the most unique and impactful forwards in European football history. 

Still possessing the size and strength to hold off defenders and dominate aerially, able to maintain possession and spray the ball out to wide players and into tight corners and between defenders, Ibrahimovic is a footballing juxtaposition. A leader and reference point, and still an intoxicating cocktail of power, presence and audacious technique. 

No more can this be encapsulated in his goal and assist vs Udinese - the first a lofted ball that the striker brought under control with an awe dropping ease, holding a defender off with one arm as casually as one might hold a door for an oncoming stranger, before sliding a pass into Franck Kessie's path. 

The goal, #11 rising up and striking an absurdly nonchalant overhead kick among the chaos of the 18 yard box after a poor clearance, highlights not only the Swede's skill, but the brazen confidence the man still possess as he approaches an age where many men are considering a poorly placed piercing or neon coloured car to maintain their youth. Zlatan maintains his rather more organically. 

At some point this season, the run Milan are on will presumably end and balance will be restored as Juventus stroll to a 10th league title, the De Ligt-Dybala-Ronaldo core too much to overcome for a side built around several men in their early 20's and a striker nearly two decades their senior. But right now, Milan look like Champions League qualification could be a minimum expectation for a team that has not found success like this in over a decade. In fact, if you squint a little, it looks a lot like 2010 right about now. 

Andrea Pirlo: "I think therefore I play" - A Review

There's always an air of disappointment that accompanies reading an autobiography. To revel in your heroes success before revealing the machinations behind thrilling victories occasionally have the effect of pulling the curtain up from behind "The Phantom Of The Opera" to reveal a small bearded man operating a lever system.

Sometimes, the mystery is better than the truth.

This is somewhat emphasized in sporting autobiographies. Never known for their literary prowess, hearing tales of physical, emotional batterings spoken through the writings of a footballer is often a redundant exercise.

Football is a spectator sport, one to be watched rather than recorded in writing. Hard analysis can be found aplenty when typed by professional fingers, but even among experts the ability to place a clear image in a readers head, one with a vividness that does justice to the sporting romance portrayed is a skill possessed by very few.

Yet there is a heady sigh that can often accompany sporting books of this nature. One (perhaps unnaturally) expects to be able so tangibly read the passion emanating from the autobiography of a Roy Keane or a Steven Gerrard that it burns red on the page. The cacophony of simple sentences that follow almost sully the image, like a Mona Lisa in a dull, unwashed frame.

It is then, with a deep pleasure to read a biography that is written with the characteristics that a reader would expect from a particular player. "I think therefore I play" by Andrea Pirlo does just that.

Pirlo is the thinking man's football player, a testament to an almost lost art of grace and calm that is a rare sight among his uber-athletic peers. As a result the midfielder looks almost frozen in time, slowing the game to a pace more suited to him, seemingly oblivious (or perhaps impervious) to the trends enveloping in the game around him.

Pirlo's now famous facial hair (which despite first appearing in 2012 feels like it has always been present) emphasizes his image of experience, the groomed veteran looking more scholarly that sporting.

His prose echoes with wit, short sentences interjected with snide comments that so neatly fit with his clever movements on the pitch. Cutting remarks about peers ("We were 4-1 up so the chance of us losing were as likely as Gattuso completing an Art Degree") are interspersed with a metaphoric view of his own ability ("After all, Dolly will never just be an ordinary sheep").

The stories you'd heard before, detailing his exit from Milan in 2011 to Silvio Berlusconi blocking his move to Chelsea in 2009 and even Real Madrid, and Italy's World Cup victory.

But what you didn't have before was the way in which Andrea told you the tale, weaving with humour like one of his famous free-kicks (a notable example was where he calls a case pulled by Adriano Galliani from under the table during negotiations as "just as well hidden as Monica Lewinsky under Bill Clinton's desk in the Oval Office.")

The simplicity of Pirlo's writing style keeps the anecdotes lively, short sentences zipping along like a well-placed pass.

In review, the book was everything I hoped, because it was nothing like I feared.

No-one, (at least not me) expected Pirlo's book to be a thesis with a more expansive vocabulary than his passing range, but it was nevertheless pleasant to read a book from a sportsperson that for once, didn't leave me unsatisfied.

Rating: 4/5