Arrigo Sacchi has claimed that Zlatan Ibrahimovic would be considered better than Lionel Messi “if football was an individual sport”.
The former Milan and Atletico Madrid boss, who also served as Real Madrid’s sporting director in 2004-05, used the former Barcelona teammates to emphasise that success was built on the team ethic as opposed to individual brilliance.
“Ibrahimovic is extremely great, and if football was an individual sport then I think he would be better than Messi,” he told Radio 2.
“That’s his great value, but it’s also a limitation if we don’t get into synergy and helping teammates.
“We always talk as if football’s an individual sport, but it’s not and we must understand that it’s about the engine.
“The engine runs the performance. It isn’t the result of a player’s skills, but their ideas and work.”
