Van Persie is a similar type to Zlatan and see where your coming from with the whole stretching the defense thing. However i think too much pressure has been placed on Messi to get the goals, they need someone like RVP to take the pressure off him. Zlatan never got 30 plus but he had a lot of injuries and when he did play, the team was very effective and have a very succesful era when he was there. Obviously falling out with Pep led to him heading back off to Barca not because he was a failure. RVP's movement can stretch defences, he comes out wide, can play in the hole, he also works a lot more than what Zlatan did.