Why do finnish people keep calling Zibanejad finnish

[FINJuniors]

My take: Zibanejad is a product of the Swedish ice hockey system, so let the Swedes have him. And I am writing this as a Finn.

 

[DeeQ]

What? Where? I've never heard anyone claim him being finnish.

 

[gritdash60]

When he scores a hattrick hes finnish descendant, when he doesn't hes swedish it's really simple as f***.

 

[WildFan887]

This one is new for me.

 

[mattihp]

Ethnicity and nationality are different things.

Nationalitywise he is Swedish and Iranian.
Ethnicitywise he is Iranian and Finnish.

Hockeywise.. He is a Swede.

 

[Henkka]

The story behind is that Zibanejad has a Finnish mother and Iranian dad who met in Sweden and Mika had citizenship to Finland, which he later changed to Swedish citizenship because he grew up in Sweden. Apparently growing up he rooted for Finland's national team and he was invited to Pohjola camp in 2008, which is a Finland's national team's U15 camp. However, there was some problem with byrocracy when Mika applied for dual citizenship and his application was denied and thus he didn't get to attend Finnish national team camp and was soon after invited to Sweden's national team camp. That's why he plays for team Sweden and not team Finland.

So you can probably believe that Finnish hockey fans who know this story

This was news for me. I've always seen this Ziba-talk only as a fun joke.

Of course he is a swede.