Gianfranco Zola

Gianfranco Zola (Italian pronunciation: [dʒaɱˈfraŋko dˈdzɔːla]; born 5 July 1966) is an Italian football executive, manager, and former footballer who played predominantly as a forward. He is currently vice-president of the Lega Pro, the Italian Serie C football league. He spent the first decade of his playing career in Italy, most notably with Napoli alongside Diego Maradona and Careca where he...

Gianfranco Zola (Italian pronunciation: [dʒaɱˈfraŋko dˈdzɔːla]; born 5 July 1966) is an Italian football executive, manager, and former footballer who played predominantly as a forward. He is currently vice-president of the Lega Pro, the Italian Serie C football league. He spent the first decade of his playing career in Italy, most notably with Napoli alongside Diego Maradona and Careca where he won the 1989–90 Serie A title, and at Parma where he won the Italian Super Cup and the 1994–95 UEFA Cup. He later moved to English side Chelsea, where he was voted the Football Writers' Player of the Year in the 1996–97 season. During his time at the club, he won the 1997–98 UEFA Cup Winners' Cup, the UEFA Super Cup, two FA Cups, the League Cup, and the Community Shield. In 2003 he was voted the greatest Chelsea player ever. He was capped 35 times for Italy from his debut in 1991, appearing at the 1994 World Cup, where Italy finished in second place, and Euro 1996. After a stint with Italy under-21s, Zola began his club managerial career with West Ham United of the Premier League in 2008, before being sacked in 2010. He was manager of Watford from July 2012 until he announced his resignation on 16 December 2013. From December 2014 to March 2015 he managed Cagliari in Serie A. He returned to Chelsea as the assistant of new manager Maurizio Sarri on 18 July 2018, ahead of the 2018–19 Premier League season. Club career Early career Born in Oliena, Zola signed his first professional contract with Sardinian team Nuorese in 1984. In 1986, he moved to the Sassari-based team Torres, where he spent three seasons. Napoli He was noticed by Luciano Moggi in Serie C1 in 1989, he signed for Napoli in Serie A for ₤2 million, making his debut that year. The young and talented Zola scored two goals as understudy to Diego Maradona as Napoli won the Serie A title in 1990, the only league title of Zola's career. Zola scored his first goal against Atalanta, whilst his second goal was scored against Genoa, during injury time, which allowed Napoli to win 2–1 and maintain a two-point lead over Milan, who were Napoli's main title contenders, in second place. Zola was excited by the transfer, and he developed an important friendship with Maradona, who commented "Finally they have bought someone shorter than me!" Maradona would prove to be a big influence on Zola's career. The two would spend hours practising free kicks together after training and Zola later said that "I learned everything from Diego. I used to spy on him every time he trained and learned how to curl a free-kick just like him." After Maradona's disqualification due to drug ban, Gianfranco Zola was considered to be the "new Maradona" and his heir at Napoli during the early 1990s. Zola helped Napoli to win the Italian Super Cup in 1990, partnering alongside Careca following Maradona's drug ban during the second part of the 1990–91 season, as Napoli finished in a disappointing seventh place. Due to his individual performances, however, Zola was given his debut for the Italy national team under coach Arrigo Sacchi in 1991, winning his first cap against Norway in November. He temporarily inherited Maradona's number 10 shirt the following season under manager Claudio Ranieri, after Maradona parted ways with the club due to his ban, scoring 12 goals in 34 appearances. Upon his departure, Maradona had recommended that the Napoli management focus on Zola's development, stating: "Napoli doesn't need to look for anyone to replace me, the team already has Zola!". In his final season with the club, he managed 12 goals in 33 league appearances, and he also finished the 1992–93 Serie A season as the joint top assist provider in the league, with 12 assists, alongside Francesco Baiano. During his time in Napoli, Zola scored a total of 32 goals in 105 appearances. Parma In 1993, Zola left Napoli and joined fellow Serie A side Parma for ₤13 million, due to the poor economic situation of the Neapolitan club. He was initially accused of betraying the club by the fans, although Zola denied this, noting that Corrado Ferlaino had also been forced to sell other important Napoli players such as Jonas Thern, Ciro Ferrara and Daniel Fonseca, in order to overcome the club's debts. With Parma, he established himself as one of the league's top players, and he achieved notable domestic and European success; he came close to winning another Serie A title, in particular during the 1994–95 season, in which he scored 19 goals in a close fought title-race with rivals Juventus, although he ultimately failed to do so. In his first season, he scored 18 league goals, and with the club, he won the UEFA Super Cup in 1993, and the UEFA Cup in 1995 with Parma, and he also reached the final of the UEFA Cup Winners' Cup in 1994, as well as the finals of the Italian Cup and the Italian Super Cup in 1995. It was with the blue and yellow club that he cemented his reputation as one of the best and most talented creative players in Italy, along with Roberto Baggio and Alessandro Del Piero. During the 1995–96 season, Zola initially experienced competition in the team with Bulgarian forward Hristo Stoichkov, who played the same tactical role as Zola; as a result, Zola would begin to be deployed in the starting eleven with less frequency, losing his place in the squad, despite scoring 10 league goals. During the following season, manager Carlo Ancelotti came to see Zola as a "square peg" unable to fit into his rigid 4–4–2 system upon his arrival at the club in 1996. Zola was played out of position in a left midfield role, scoring only 2 goals, as Ancelotti preferred to play Hernán Crespo and Enrico Chiesa up-front. Zola became frustrated of playing in this role and ultimately made himself available for a transfer, moving to Premier League side Chelsea in November 1996. In total, Zola made 102 league appearances with Parma, scoring 49 goals. Chelsea In November 1996, Zola joined Chelsea for £4.5 million as one of several continental players signed by Ruud Gullit (including compatriot Gianluca Vialli) and was assigned the number 25 jersey. He made his debut in a 1–1 draw with Blackburn Rovers at Ewood Park. In his debut season he demonstrated his skill and talent, and put in several notable performances, scoring a series of memorable goals. In February 1997, after spiriting the ball around Manchester United's defence in the penalty area before slotting the ball past goalkeeper Peter Schmeichel, he was described by United manager Alex Ferguson as a "clever little so-and-so". He was a key player in Chelsea's resurgence in the 1996–97 season, helping them win the FA Cup with a 2–0 win over Middlesbrough at Wembley Stadium having scored four goals en route to the final, including a 25-yard curling shot against Liverpool as Chelsea came from 0–2 behind to win 4–2, and a memorable goal of individual skill in the semi-final against Wimbledon, backheeling the ball and turning 180 degrees before slotting the ball into the net. At the end of the season he was voted FWA Player of the Year, the only player ever to win the accolade without playing a full season in the English league and the first Chelsea player to win it. In the 1997–98 season, Zola helped Chelsea win three more trophies, the League Cup, the Cup Winners' Cup and the Super Cup. An injury denied him a place in the starting line-up for the Cup Winners' Cup final against Stuttgart at the Råsunda Stadium in Stockholm, but he still played an important part in Chelsea's victory, as he came on as a second-half substitute and scored the winning goal after barely 30 seconds. With only his second touch of the game, he struck a through ball from Dennis Wise into the roof of the net to secure Chelsea's third major trophy in a year and the second European trophy in the club's history. In the same season, Zola hit his first professional hat-trick, in a 4–0 victory over Derby County at Stamford Bridge in November 1997. When Chelsea made their first appearance in the Champions League in 1999–2000, Zola was a key player throughout the campaign, although he found his chances in the Premier League more limited, owing to manager Gianluca Vialli's squad rotation policy. Zola scored three goals in Chelsea's run to the Champions League quarter-finals, including a curling free kick against Barcelona, and he again won the FA Cup with the club, with his free-kick in the final against Aston Villa setting up Roberto Di Matteo's winner. His later years with Chelsea saw his appearances restricted by the new strike pairing of Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink and Eiður Guðjohnsen. During the 2000–01 Premier League season, Zola managed 9 league goals. In the 2001–02 season, Zola's starting chances became limited, after a summer when Claudio Ranieri showed the door to many of Chelsea's ageing stars such as club captain Dennis Wise, goalscoring midfielder Gustavo Poyet and French defender Frank Leboeuf, scoring only 3 goals. Zola was limited to infrequent starts and many substitute appearances due to Ranieri's new policy of decreasing the average age of the Chelsea squad, preferring to play the Icelandic youngster Gudjohnsen with Hasselbaink. Zola did draw attention, however, for his dominant performance when he scored with a notable backheeled effort in mid-air from a corner-kick, in an FA Cup tie against Norwich City on 16 January 2002. Manager Claudio Ranieri described the goal as "fantasy, magic". In 2002–03, his final season with Chelsea, he enjoyed a renaissance, scoring 16 goals, his highest seasonal tally for Chelsea, and was voted the club's player of the year after helping Chelsea qualify for the Champions League. Zola scored his final goal for Chelsea, a lob from outside the penalty area against Everton, on Easter Monday 2003. He made his final competitive appearance for the club on the final day of the season with a 20-minute cameo against Liverpool, beating four Liverpool players with a dribble late on in the match, gaining applause from both sets of fans in one of the final moments of his career. He played in a total of 312 games for Chelsea and scored 80 goals, scoring 59 goals in 229 Premier League appearances. He subsequently decided to return to Italy during the following season. Zola was voted as the best ever Chelsea player by Chelsea's fans in early 2003. In November 2004, he was awarded an OBE, Honorary Member of the Order of the British Empire in a special ceremony in Rome. In 2005, Zola was voted into the Chelsea F.C. Centenary Eleven, occupying one of the two forward roles. No Chelsea player held Zola's number 25 shirt since his departure in 2003 until the number was given to Moisés Caicedo 20 years later in 2023 after he contacted Zola for permission to wear the shirt. Zola was also voted by The Sun one of the top ten best foreign "artistic" players in Premier League history in 2007, coming in second place behind George Best. Cagliari In the summer of 2003, amid rumours of an impending takeover at Chelsea, Zola left Stamford Bridge to join Cagliari, from his native Sardinia. Within a week Chelsea was acquired by Russian billionaire Roman Abramovich. It was reported that Abramovich tried to buy the entire Cagliari club when Zola refused to renege on his verbal contract with Cagliari, although Zola himself will not confirm it. Zola subsequently led Cagliari to promotion to the Italian Serie A, then renewed his contract for one more year. He retired in June 2005, after ending his career in appropriate style with a double against Juventus in his last professional game. His number 10 Cagliari jersey was withdrawn in his honour for the season after he left but was worn in the 2006–07 season by Andrea Capone. Zola retired as the fifth highest goalscorer of free-kicks in Serie A history, with 20 goals from set-pieces, and currently sits behind only Francesco Totti and Roberto Baggio (both at 21), Alessandro Del Piero (22), Andrea Pirlo (26) and Siniša Mih