Ibra makes tearful return, set for Georgia clash Thursday

AC Milan’s Zlatan Ibrahimovic shed a few tears of pride as he returned to Sweden’s national team after a four-year absence for their World Cup qualifiers.

He recounted how his son did not want him to leave home to join up with Janne Andersson’s squad.

The 39-year-old, who quit international football after Euro 2016, choked up when he was asked what his boys, Maximilian, 14, and 12-year-old Vincent, thought of his decision to answer his country’s call again and return to the world stage.

“Vincent cried when I left him,” Ibra told a news conference before shedding a few tears himself as he felt the emotion of returning to the national team set-up in his first meeting with the media since his recall alongside coach Andersson.

Sweden’s all-time top scorer, with 62 goals in 116 games, said in in a newspaper interview in late 2020 that he wanted to end his international exile and Andersson quickly flew to Milan to sort out the terms for the former captain’s return.

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“To play in the national team is the biggest thing you can do as a football player, and as I was following them [Sweden], inside me I was feeling I think I can help them, I think I can do something,” Ibra told reporters

Sweden host Georgia in their first 2022 World Cup qualifier on Thursday before visiting Kosovo three days later and rounding off with a friendly against Estonia.