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27th Jul 2017

No injured 35-year-old should be as shredded as Zlatan Ibrahimovic is

Someone's been eating his vegetables

Darragh Culhane

The lack of exercise over the last few months hasn’t taken its toll anyway.

Zlatan Ibrahimovic hasn’t been able to train a whole lot the last few months as he recovers from cruciate ligament damage.

You’d excuse him for piling on the pounds during his injury layoff, but he hasn’t.

On the same day that it was reported that the Swede might, in fact, be returning to Manchester United he decided to share a somewhat revealing photo of himself.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BXDEU4IAXYK/?taken-by=iamzlatanibrahimovic

The comparison is pretty accurate, the absolute monster.

Even as his 36th birthday approaches, Ibrahimovic continues to stay faithful to his dedicated fitness regime which involves a wide range of exercises, including martial arts and extensive stretching.

The forward famously broke records when his power was tested during his Manchester United medical 12 months ago and, at the time, his agent Mino Raiola suggested Ibrahimovic was fit enough to continue playing into his forties.

“If I have to judge him today, then it’s another five years,” Raiola told the Sunday Times. “But I saw Pavel [Nedved] also. I saw Pavel push every year until one day [approaching 37] he said stop. So, it’s not a question of your physics, it’s a question of your mentality.”