Rafael van der Vaart speaks out on ‘FIGHTING’ Zlatan Ibrahimovic, as he reveals why his former team-mate was ‘an a***hole’ at Ajax

Rafael van der Vaart has claimed that Zlatan Ibrahimovic was an ‘a***hole’ while the pair played for Ajax and detailed the ‘fights’ they used to have while at the club.

The duo were at the Dutch side together from 2001 and 2004 with the Swede bagging 48 goals in 110 matches for the team after moving from Malmo.

He eventually headed off to Juventus and went on to score 558 times in 948 games in a stellar career.

Meanwhile, van der Vaart switched his boyhood club for Hamburger in 2005 before transferring to Real Madrid where he faced Ibrahimovic, who was at Barcelona, in the 2009-10 season. 

The Dutchman ended up having a successful stint at Tottenham from 2010 to 2012 and eventually retired in 2018.

The two talents were among Ajax’s biggest stars of the early 2000s but did not quite see eye to eye, as van der Vaart explained in an interview with talkSPORT. 

The duo starred for Ajax between 2001 and 2004 and the Dutchman said they would ‘fight’

The Swede went on to play for Manchester United towards the end of a glittering career

He said: ‘[Ibrahimovic] was an a***hole. We had big fights. He was massive. Not “fight” fights but we couldn’t get along. He was really arrogant in my point of view, I had a big ego, we were both young.

‘We had to play together – that was manageable – but there came a point where we had a national game against Sweden and he kicked me on the ankle. It was really bad.

‘I was lying there, crying almost, and I looked at him – he was my team-mate at Ajax – and he was just walking away.

‘After the game I went mad on the press, I said he did it on purpose. When I came into the dressing room I thought, “oh s***, don’t say that”, so I called him in person and said, “I’m sorry I said that in the press” and then it was totally okay.

‘Next day in training, we had a big [meeting] with the whole team and I thought it was okay and then he went totally on me, screaming, and I screamed back. Some parts of the team chose him and some parts my side. 

‘Two days later he left for Juventus because I had to leave or him and that’s why he went to Juventus. It was because he said, “I don’t want to play with him any more”, and I said the same. I was lucky I could stay at my dream club.’

The former Spurs and Netherlands midfielder insisted that the pair had smoothed over their original disagreements and that it was mainly the product of their youthful egos. 

‘After that we played each other a few times and now we are totally okay,’ he added.

Van der Vaart claimed that Ibrahimovic found another level when he moved to Juventus

It comes after he made the odd remark that he had ‘never seen [Cristiano Ronaldo’s] penis’

Ronaldo hit back at his former team-mate with a brutal response posted to Instagram

‘When he left for Juventus he became really good and although I didn’t like him I was enjoying his goals.

‘I really hope that I can see him again because I have so much respect for him and we laugh about it because I also made really big mistakes and he did and [Ronald] Koeman did and we were all young with a big ego.’

Van der Vaart’s honest remarks come after he revealed he had ‘never seen [Cristiano Ronaldo’s] penis’, in a shocking remark which the midfielder clarified meant that the Portuguese was always out on the training field and never came into the showers.

The Dutchman told the station’s TheLineUp podcast: ‘He never left the house! I always tell this joke: Ronaldo is the only player whose penis I’ve never seen. He was always the first one to train and the last one to leave.’ 

It seems that Ronaldo has not taken kindly to van der Vaart’s crude comments and took to Instagram this week to deliver a brutal response to the cheeky Dutchman. 

The icon posted, ‘Who is that guy?’, under a reposting of the remarks on the platform. 

It remains to be seen how Ibrahimovic will react to van der Vaart’s latest quip.