PHOTO: Mario Mandzukic's Hebrew tattoo is all kinds of wrong

Mario Mandzukic needs a new tattoo artist. 

Or, at the very least, never go back to the one who was responsible for the ink on his lower back that he showed off to the world in Tuesday's Champions League match against Real Madrid.

By virtue of being punched in the stomach (thanks, Dani Carvajal), bloodied after taking an arm to the face (thanks, Sergio Ramos) and perhaps even bitten (Carvajal again), the Croatian striker spent plenty of time getting cozy with the turf at the Vicente Calderon.

On one such occasion, cameras caught the 28-year-old in the fetal position, which forced his shirt to ride up and reveal a lower-back tattoo written in Hebrew. 

(Courtesy: Soccer Gods)

It looks perfectly harmless from afar, but some keen eyes on social media discovered a rather significant issue. What's the problem, exactly?

Stuart Winer of The Times of Israel explains:

Puzzled fans took to social media in an effort to decipher the ink. It was quickly identified as Hebrew but the translation remained elusive, until sharp-eyed readers pointed out that the text was written from left to right instead of from right to left. In addition, the letters themselves were facing the wrong way, giving the slogan the appearance of being in mirror writing, and suggesting that the tattoo artist was either an aspiring Leonardo da Vinci, who wrote mainly in mirror-image cursive, or hopelessly incompetent.

Once the bizarre lettering had been sorted out, it emerged that the tattoo aimed to proclaim “What doesn’t kill me makes me stronger,” although spelling errors rendered the actual translation closer to the grammatically awkward “Which doesn’t to kill me, makes me stronger.”

Unless Mandzukic was really going for some unique ink - in which case, he's an artist and a visionary - he should probably go looking for a refund. Hey, at least his arm sleeve looks great.

- With h/t to Bleacher Report