Gianfranco Zola spent the first decade of his career playing in Italy, most notably with Napoli, alongside Diego Maradona and Careca, and at Parma, before moving to English side Chelsea, where he was voted Football Writers’ Player of the Year in 1997 and Chelsea’s greatest ever player. He was capped 35 times for Italy.
Zola helped Chlesea win four trophies and scored the winner in the 1998 European Cup Winners’ Cup Final just seconds after coming on as substitute. In all Zola, scored 80 goals in 312 games, with many of them being spectacular efforts.
Above all, Zola always played football as if he enjoyed it and was almost universally popular amongst opposition fans.
