Highlights
- Zlatan Ibrahimovic hospitalised Materazzi with a kung-fu kick and flying elbow during the Milan derby in 2010.
- Ibrahimovic later revealed that the tackle was a deliberate act of revenge which was years in the making.
- Materazzi responded to Ibrahimovic's revelation with a sarcastic Instagram post about winning the Champions League.
Zlatan Ibrahimovic and Marco Materazzi don't exactly see eye to eye. While the famously volatile pair might have shared the Inter Milan dressing room together once upon a time, it's fair to say that their relationship grew sour by the time Ibrahimovic donned the black and red stripes of AC Milan.
Ibrahimovic Hospitalised Materazzi in 2010
Zlatan caught his opponent with a kung-fu kick and flying elbow during the Milan derby
Materazzi is no stranger to painful incidents on a football pitch. After all, he is perhaps most famous for having been head-butted by Zinedine Zidane in the 2006 World Cup final.
However, remarkably, the Italian defender might argue that it was actually the fiery culmination of his beef with Ibrahimovic that actually hurt a lot more than his clash with 'Zizou'. That's because Materazzi was sent to hospital courtesy of a kung-fu kick and flying elbow from Ibrahimovic during the first Milan derby of the 2010/11 season in Serie A.
As confirmed by Goal at the time, Materazzi - nicknamed 'Matrix' - was hospitalised for what can only be described as a Taekwondo move. To add insult to literal injury, Ibrahimovic was staggeringly only awarded a yellow card.
Why Zlatan got Revenge on Materazzi
Zlatan confessed to intentionally hurting his opponent
Ibrahimovic denied that it was a deliberate foul at the time, only to later reveal that the brutal tackle was indeed an act of revenge that had been years upon years in the making. The Daily Mail quotes Ibrahimovic as explaining to GQ Magazine in 2019 what was really going on:
"Materazzi entered a challenge like an assassin and hurt me. He was a tough football player, that's OK. But there's two ways to be tough, one of them is aiming to hurt you. Even [Paolo] Maldini was tough, but with a different objective.
"It was Juventus-Inter in 2006 and after the foul I had to leave the pitch for a moment and [coach Fabio] Capello said: 'I'll substitute you'. I said: 'no, I'll go on.' I wanted to return to the pitch to get my revenge on Matrix. If someone does that to me, I won't forget about it. But after two minutes, I'm in too much pain to go on. I can't play. Then I go to Inter, Barcelona, Milan…
"In the first game, the 2010-11 derby, they were all against me. OK, this motivates me. But, if you don't have any control, it's not good. You'll lose your head and do something stupid. I got a penalty, and who fouled me? Materazzi. 1-0 Milan.
"In the second half, Matrix is coming at me and I hit him with a taekwondo move, I sent him to the hospital. [Dejan] Stankovic asked me: 'Why did you do that?' And I replied to him: 'I have been waiting for this moment for four years. That's why.' Then I left. What goes around comes around."
It certainly speaks to the driven sort of personality that the forward had, to wait so long to get revenge for something and then to execute it in such dramatic fashion that you send the guy to hospital.
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The Italian defender hit back at Zlatan after his revelation
And as soon as Ibrahimovic revealed that he was deliberately out to get Materazzi, the Italian defender responded on Instagram by posting a picture of him celebrating winning the Champions League. The former Inter Milan hero wrote in the caption: “I came… I saw… I conquered. Always and in any case, THANK YOU, Ibrahimovic. Without you, we would never have WON.”
Ibrahimovic, who retired from professional football in 2023, famously never won Europe's premier cup competition as he left both Inter and Barcelona the season before they went onto lift 'Big Ears'. And so, Materazzi's social media post likely would have stung – although probably not as getting kung-fu kicked mid-game.
In fact, the Swedish striker doesn't seem too bothered about not winning the Champions League anyway. Back in 2017, he told Sky Sport Italia (via Sport Star): "I want to win it at all costs, every year that I play, I want to win: but let me turn this around to every player who had one super season and won the Champions League, then disappeared and never won anything else.
"I, on the other hand, have won consistently every year – and I mean every single year. I wouldn't change these 20 years or 33 trophies for one Champions League, because I proved every year who I was and I dominated every year."
Typically confident words from one of football's biggest personalities.