EXCLUSIVE: For Me Second Place Is Last Place - Barcelona's Zlatan Ibrahimovic

They don't come much happier than Zlatan Ibrahimovic when his team have won. The tall Swedish striker may not have got his name on the scoresheet in Barcelona's romp over Sevilla, but he couldn't have been more delighted at the outcome.

After being dumped out of the Spanish Cup by the Andalucian side Barcelona were in the mood for revenge. On a rain sodden night at the Camp Nou, they got it in heaps.

As one journalist loudly declared after the game, "it was like taking someone you don't much like, holding them against a wall and just beating them up." Whilst its not a very pleasant concept, it does give an indication of what happened on the night. To put it another way, if this had not been a football match, the police would have probably arrested Barcelona for showing such cruelty.

"Without doubt it was a good game for us. It was all about scoring the first goal. Once that happened it just opened it up for us so much more," Ibrahimovic said afterwards.

"We had some great possibilities to score. I had some chances to score after only about five or 10 minutes, but I didn't hit the goal. But it was that kind of a game. You score one goal and then you know you can score many more."

Both sides will no doubt be glad to see the back of each other having now met three times in just 10 days, after the two-legged Copa del Rey tie. Sevilla knocked the champions out of the cup and did it the hard way, winning 2-1 in the Camp Nou, before losing 1-0 at home to scrape through on away goals.

So how much was Saturday's performance to do with gaining revenge for the cup exit?

Ibrahimovic laughs. "No, it wasn't anything about revenge. We want to beat EVERY team that comes up against us. And if we win or if we don't, we would still have played with the same mentality because this is the mentality of the club and of the players. We want to win every game, but of course we have to be realistic as well. There are many games to play and you are bound to get down periods."

Whatever the down period was after being knocked out of the Cup, it would have been more than made up for by events taking place at San Mames earlier on Saturday evening. Real Madrid's unexpected 1-0 defeat to Athletic Bilbao now opens up a five-point cushion for Barcelona at the top of La Liga. Real played their game before the Catalans took to the pitch, but Ibrahimovic didn't feel it made any difference to their own performance.

"We didn't think too much about them. We were two points clear already anyway. If we are focused on our game and play our own way in every match then we don't have to think about them. But I don't know how it affects players. You would have to ask the others about that, but for me personally it makes no difference knowing their result, because I know we have to go out there and win every game, so that doesn't change." 

The Spanish media are already regarding the two results as being pivotal. The Catalan sports paper El Mundo Deportivo has a cheeky headline this Sunday which simply says "Adios, Madrid". They clearly see the five-point advantage as being unassailable, but that's clearly not how the Swede sees it.

"No, absolutely not!" Zlatan exclaims, almost shocked. "We have still a LOT of games to play. Of course we do have the advantage with the five points. But we just have to continue as we are, and I think only about that. We have to think that we are equal with them [on points], and that will give us more stimulation and more motivation."

Zlatan has a huge amount of motivation. He declared when arriving at Barcelona that, although the team had won many titles, he had won nothing with them and he wanted them to do it all over again. So he is clearly disappointed that the club has fallen at the first hurdle in the defence of the Copa del Rey.

"When you go out of a tournament or you don't win then for me its like this:  second place is the same as being in last place.

"I want to win everything. Yes, it is a disaster to go out of any competition. We did our best in the Copa, but we have to go on now. We still have two trophies to play for. We are first in La Liga and we have Stuttgart in the Champions League, so we will now go for that. But yeah, sure, we are disappointed we are out of the Copa del Rey, but then next year offers us another possibility."