Zola makes impact in West Ham interview

Gianfranco Zola has emerged as one of the two front-runners to be the next West Ham manager after impressing club officials in an interview yesterday.

Zola is being considered alongside his fellow Italian Roberto Donadoni after Slaven Bilic's advisers told West Ham the Croat would not be available until January. If the Croatia coach adheres to that then the club will not wait for him, and will look to either Zola or Donadoni, though the former Danish international Michael Laudrup is still in contention as well.

Donadoni also made a good impression when he was interviewed on Friday, while Laudrup is due to have talks with theclub tomorrow.

Zola, the former Chelsea midfielder who was voted the club's greatest-ever player by Blues fans and who is now the joint coach of the Italy Under-21 side, does have years of experience in English football and that stood him in good stead when he met club officials in Rome yesterday morning. A high-level source from within the club said: "Zola not only has impressive cred-entials but also came across incredibly well in our talks."

The fact that Zola and Donadoni are Italian could turn out to be a decisive factor given that West Ham's director of football, Gianluca Nani, is a compatriot. It also suggests they would be much happier with a continental-style working relationship than Alan Curbishley was.

The short-list to succeed Curbishley has now been whittled now to Zola, Donadoni and Bilic, with Laudrup still an outside possibility. Bilic could come back into the reckoning but he would have to change tack on his public plans – or at the very least ask to take charge of the rest of Croatia's matches this year on apart-time basis .

West Ham's selection process has effectively ruled out the former Liverpool manager, the Frenchman Gérard Houllier, as well as the former Scotland midfielder John Collins and the former Ajax coach Martin Olsen.

Interesting? Click here to explore further