Source: Team_Talk
Jack sad to see Zola leave
West Ham midfielder Jack Collison has admitted he was disappointed with the decision to axe Gianfranco Zola at the end of last season.[LNB] Tthe Italian was fired by the Hammers at the end of last season, a decison which the 22-year-old Collison found hard to take.[LNB]"He was the one who gave me my big chance and I feel like I owe him a lot," said Collison on Soccer AM. [LNB]"He took an interest in a lot of the young lads and for me it was great learning off someone like him because he wasn't a bad player, was he?[LNB]"He could still play.He joined in during training and some of the stuff he would do was pretty unbelievable. The first day in training we were playing two touch; he got the ball, flicked it round the corner and dinked Rob Green. Everyone just stood there and was like 'whoa, what have we got here?'[LNB]"He was really good. After training sometimes he'd take the boys for a one-to-one session which was nice to see from a manager, you don't always get that.[LNB]"He took a real interest. He let all the boys go out there and express themselves, which was nice. It's just a shame what happened."[LNB]Collison - who last featured for the first team in February - recently underwent an operation to solve a long-standing knee problem, from which he expects to return at the beginning of 2011.[LNB]"I'm hoping to be back around Christmas time," he confirmed. "I had an operation about four months ago to stabalise my knee cap and to have a bit of a tidy up."
