• Gianfranco Zola was a special player who scored special goals

• The much-loved Italian lit up Serie A and the Premier League across the Nineties

• His long career at the top has ensured a considerable net worth

Born on the beautiful island of Sardinia on July 5th, 1966, Gianfranco Zola’s artistic brand of football was admired by one and all, especially supporters of the six clubs he created memorable goals, assists and moments for.

At each club the little forward was cherished, with Chelsea even doing him the honour of retiring his shirt number on leaving Stamford Bridge.

Prior to that, Zola made over 200 appearances in Serie A, for Napoli and Parma respectively. Again, at both clubs, he was venerated.

In Italy, he won a league title with Napoli and enjoyed European glory with Parma while his move to West London coincided with the Blues attaining lots of silverware.

According to our latest betting odds, Chelsea are in the running to win further trophies this season.

But it wasn’t simply about success with Zola. His rare gifts made him a joy to watch and subsequently he became one of the most popular players in Premier League history.

Indeed, so highly is Zola regarded in his adopted country, he has been given an OBE and inducted into the English Football Hall of Fame.

All of which, across an illustrious career during a period when fortunes were poured into the game, has made Gianfranco Zola a very rich individual. Very few would claim he wasn’t worth every penny and Euro.

Football Career

There are a certain number of 90s footballers who are universally recalled with great fondness and Zola is certainly among them.

Coming to the fore at Napoli, as an understudy to Diego Maradona, the diminutive schemer would go on to inherit the Argentine’s fabled number 10 jersey in Sicily, scoring 32 goals in 105 appearances.

A £13m transfer to Parma in 1993 had him compete with Hristo Stoichkov for a starring role up front but eventually relocated to the left, the player worried about his standing within the international set-up.

For the Azzurri, Zola made only 35 outings, a surprising tally given his immense talent.

A move to ambitious Chelsea followed in the mid-Nineties, to a club on the up who were making a series of cosmopolitan signings.

In the capital, Zola exhibited his full range of magical qualities over seven seasons, helping his side win two FA Cups, a League Cup, and a European honour.

Twice he was voted the club’s Player of the Year while beyond the Bridge he was hugely admired for his vision, touch, and ability to invent a goal from seemingly nowhere.

A week before Chelsea were bought by Roman Abramovich, the striker left and wound down his career at Cagliari, winning promotion to the Italian top-flight in his swansong campaign.

How Much Is Gianfranco Zola Worth?

Zola is said to be worth a little north of £26m, a substantial sum that has partly been obtained from a consequent move into management, with West Ham, Watford and Birmingham the three biggest clubs he has taken charge of.

His latter days at Chelsea had the brilliant forward on £2m per year – a sharp rise from £700,000 a year on arriving seven years earlier - and to illustrate Zola’s integrity he was offered a third more to stay but had already given Cagliari his word to move there in 2003 on a significantly reduced wage of £400,000.

In 2008, a £1.9m per year package tempted the recently retired player into management at West Ham and his time in the dug out further demonstrates Zola’s ethics, not complaining when he was forced to take a pay cut soon after.

He later chose to resign at Watford, thus depriving himself of a bumper pay-off.

It is a sense of decency that extends beyond his direct earnings from football, with the player hardly known for commercial tie-ins that many of his contemporaries found lucrative.

There was a long-standing boot deal with Mizuno, a Japanese sports brand but elsewhere the quietly-spoken and humble Zola was not one for putting his name to various products.

Instead, he made a left-turn post-retirement and founded his own company, a high-end ice cream business that has stores across London and Milan.

Each café sells a range of gelato in different flavours with a recent branch opening just a mile from his beloved Stamford Bridge.

Family

On the pitch, Zola was a wizard, a favourite of the live betting community due to his unerring ability to turn a game on its head from a drop of his shoulder. A superstar no less.

Off it however, he remained throughout his high-profile career and is still to this day, a private family man, happily married to Franca, and raising three children.

Their eldest child, Andrea, followed in his father’s footsteps only as a very different kind of player, specializing as a full-back for Greys Athletic at non-league level after coming through West Ham’s famed academy.

Franca meanwhile was a constant source of support to Zola throughout his playing career, often attending games and accompanying him to events.

The forward has joked in the past that she would dispute his nice guy reputation with a tendency to be grumpy after defeats.

Moments of Magic

Nicknamed ‘Magic Box’ by his adoring fans in West London, Zola was capable of pulling off the spectacular, even defying belief at times with goals that live long in the memory.

One such goal was an impish back-heel from a corner against Norwich in 2002, a mesmerizing piece of skill that has been pored over on YouTube close to half a million times.

The poor Canaries were on the receiving end that day and face hardship again with our Premier League predictions tipping them for the drop.

Another, at Manchester United’s expense in 1997 had him dancing through the Reds defence, leaving them bamboozled.

But it was free-kicks that were Zola’s real forte, a talent honed by spending countless hours after training with the legendary Maradona at Napoli.

Only four other players have scored more free-kicks in Serie A history while at Chelsea he routinely rippled the net after finding a trajectory over or around a wall.

One commentator put it best when describing one of his 59 Premier League strikes – Gianfranco Zola was a special player who scored special goals.

*Credit for all of the photos in this article belongs to AP Photo*

FIRST PUBLISHED: 18th April 2022

• Sergio Aguero is Manchester City’s all-time leading goal scorer with 260 goals

• Raheem Sterling is close to breaking into City’s top 10 scorers

• Read below for Manchester City’s all-time top scorers

We’ve dived into Manchester City’s all-time leading scorers list.

Led by a man who often featured in Premier League top scorer odds, this collection of City stars is a journey through the history of the club from the 1890s through to the glories under the management of Roberto Mancini, Manuel Pellegrini and Pep Guardiola.

Plenty played years before European football tips were even a topic of discussion. Others enjoyed success on the continental stage. Here are the 10 leading goal scorers in the history of Manchester City.

Fred Tilson – 132 goals

Plying his trade for Manchester City between the wars, Fred Tilson doesn’t immediately come to mind when thinking of the best Manchester City players of all-time, but the former striker is an inductee of the club’s Hall of Fame.

Tilson enjoyed promotion to the top flight early in his City career, and featured in several deep FA Cup runs. He moved to Northampton Town in 1938, but returned to Manchester as chief scout in his post-playing career.

Billie Gillespie – 132 goals

Twice winner of the Second Division and lifting the FA Cup in 1904, Billie Gillespie played in a very different era. Football before the First World War was a far cry from the glitz and glamour of City’s 21st century megastars.

Gillespie, though, was a big name at the club in his era, signing from Strathclyde in 1897.

Prolific throughout his period with the club, his stint came to an end in controversial when he refused to pay a fine from the FA and moved to the United States.

Tommy Browell – 139 goals

Debuting for City in 1913, Tommy Browell had such an impact at the club that a street near Maine Road was named after him.

Putting up impressive numbers with both Hull and Everton and catching more than his fair share of headlines, Browell signed with City for £1,780 and was immediately impacted.

The First World War stole some of his peak years, but he returned to goal scoring form when sport resumed and finished with 139 goals for the Manchester club.

Francis Lee – 148 goals

The star man through one of Manchester City’s most successful periods, Francis Lee was believed to be the final piece of the puzzle when he arrived from Bolton.

He lived up to the hype and then some, even scoring in their final day win to secure the league title.

Lee continued to impress in the coming seasons, scoring goals aplenty as City won the FA Cup, League Cup and European Cup Winners’ Cup.

It’s no secret that Lee’s goal tallies were boosted by penalties and there were accusations of diving – it could be argued his skill for winning spot kicks was a sign he was before his time.

Billy Meredith – 152 goals

First playing for Manchester City in 1894, Billy Meredith’s final appearance for the club came three decades later (there was a spell with Manchester United in between two City stints).

Meredith avoided injuries throughout his career thanks to extreme agility and fitness. He approached the game with a level of seriousness that many of his peers did not – he did not drink or smoke, and committed to numerous additional training sessions.

With quick feet and crossing ability, Meredith was primarily utilised on the flank, which makes his goal tally all the more impressive.

His impact on the game went far beyond the on-pitch, however, as he was a driving force in the founding of the Players’ Union.

Joe Hayes – 152 goals

The club’s third-highest goal scorer at the time of his retirement, Joe Hayes won an FA Cup with Manchester City in the 1950s and was prolific for several seasons in a row.

Like so many players in that era, though, a knee injury impacted Hayes’ abilities. He was never the same player, losing some of the burst that made him such an effective inside forward.

The Kearsley native moved to Barnsley in 1965 and finished his career with Wigan.

Colin Bell – 153 goals

The King of the Kippax was long regarded as Manchester City’s greatest ever player. Modern stars have surpassed Bell in that category, but he remains a club legend and their fourth-highest goal scorer of all-time.

Combining sublime technical ability with Olympian-level fitness, Bell had nine consecutive seasons of 10 or more goals for the club.

He won honours domestic and continental with City, and was inducted into the English Football Hall of Fame in 2005.

Tommy Johnson – 166 goals

Known for a lethal left-footed shot, Tommy Johnson spent the first decade of his career with Manchester City and holds the club record for the most goals in a single season with 38.

He left to play alongside Dixie Dean for Everton in 1930, however, and then joined Liverpool.

Like so many players, Johnson’s career was bookended by the Second World War. He played his final match for Darwen in 1939.

Eric Brook – 177 goals

Manchester City’s all-time leading scorer for the best part of a century, Eric Brook played for the club from 1928 until the start of the Second World War.

He was at the centre of FA Cup and league wins and put together 11 consecutive seasons with at least 10 goals in all competitions.

Brook remained at the club through ups and downs, but his career was brought to an end when he suffered a fractured skull while traveling to a wartime international against South Africa.

Sergio Aguero – 260 goals

Quite simply one of the greatest players to feature in Premier League predictions, Sergio Aguero looked destined to hold this record from the day he arrived at the club.

Aguero cruised by Brook’s tally, enjoying eight seasons with 20 or more goals and five where he reached 30 or better.

Amid five league titles and numerous other cups, it goes without saying that Aguero’s goal against QPR in 2012 is the defining moment of his footballing career and a lifelong memory for City fans.