Almost every country, sooner or later, has a young star compared to Lionel Messi. If you’re Swedish, though, the big next you’re keeping your eye out for isn’t the next Messi. It’s the next Zlatan Ibrahimovic. And some think that country has their next Ibrahimovic in 17-year-old striker Alexander Isak.
Certainly the player has a rumoured list of suitors befitting that kind of a comparison, with reports in Catalan paper Sport claiming Barcelona are interested in the youngster. And along with Barcelona, Sport claim there is serious interest in Isak from Real Madrid, Bayern Munich, and Liverpool.
If that list is accurate, it certainly suggests Isak is set to become something special. It would also make him a difficult player to sign away from the Swedish Allsvenskan side AIK Fotboll. So far in the 2016 season, Isak has made 20 appearances for AIK, scoring seven goals at a rate of a goal every 169 minutes.
So far, Isak has been a regular for Sweden at the youth levels who—as one would expect given the Ibrahimovic comparisons—typically lines up as a number nine, though he has also played a deeper role for club and country at times.