FC Copenhagen has spent 12 of the past 13 years to drøne around Europe in either the big Champions League or the more modest Europa League.
It is the latter tournament, which these days has sent the people of copenhagen to St. Gallen in Switzerland to meeting Lugano, and while manager Stale Solbakken and 21 players sat on the plane in Copenhagen, detonated the mighty Zlatan Ibrahimovic a bomb in the Swedish football.
the Man with a statue in front of the stadium and the (nearly) eternal hero status in the Malmö FF took over a quarter of the stockholm Hammarby and declared it as the club with the greatest potential to be the greatest in Scandinavia.
The move is an attack on FC Copenhagen, who probably even consider themselves as the holder of the title just for the time being. But Stale Solbakken’s pretty cool about it.
“here we live very well with. The competition is there all the time. And Malmö is in the driver’s seat now as a strong competitor. There are also two other large clubs in Stockholm, AIK and Djurgården. And IFK Göteborg has worn out a little financially.”
“There are many strong traditionsklubber. I do not use so much time on it. I sleep just fine on top of the news,” says FCK manager.
FC Copenhagen trained on Wednesday evening 250 kilometers from Lugano in the town of St. Gallen, where the sydschweiziske club has rented, as their own stadium does not live up to UEFAs rules.
And it was here with a view to with a win to play very close on the advancement of the group in the Europa League, to Stale Solbakken stood and pondered the threat from Hammarby and Zlatan Ibrahimovic.
“They are a club which has a big publikumspotentiale, and that comes from a big city where they have a nice arena. But they are missing some cups in the cupboard, some vindertraditioner and some different factors around it, which of course must be built on,” says FCK manager and recognises that there is a factor, where Zlatan Ibrahimovic will have a competitive advantage.
“If Zlatan uses all his money on Hammarby, so they have probably a fair chance,” says FCK manager.
FC Copenhagen have over the last several years has done much to put themselves in the belt which, at least today’s quite large scandinavian club. The discussions about which club actually is it, pops up periodically and lands somewhere between history and the present.
And now there is new competition, while FC Copenhagen is on a new european expedition. A cruise, which means with a win over Lugano on Thursday evening and a Dynamo Kiev win over Malmö FF ends with a trip in the Europa League after the new year.
Why have Stale Solbakkens thoughts also been in a place other than on Zlatan Ibrahimovic, Hammarby, tronetrusler and a vandalized statue of the great Swedish player in front of his old stadium in Malmö.
But Solbakken would like to realize one thing.
“It is very surprising. It is, when you think about the background, he has in the south of sweden (Malmö FF, red.),” sounds from Solbakken.
FC Københan and Lugano clashing in St. Gallen on Thursday evening at 21.00.
