'Quick Learner' Zola Adapting to Management Well, Says Clarke

Steve Clarke is impressed by Gianfranco Zola's aptitude for management and the Italian's assistant is enjoying the Upton Park challenge since leaving Chelsea in September to join his former team-mate in the East End.

"He understands the role more," said Clarke of Zola's first experience of club management. "He knows you've always got some problem, there's always someone coming to ask your opinion, there's always someone wanting advice on something. He's very intelligent, Franco, and he's very quickly learning that it is not such an easy job." Zola has won only three of his 14 games in charge of West Ham, but Clarke said he took the role of assistant manager with open eyes and is enjoying the challenge even as the club flirt with the relegation zone.

"It's been pretty much as I thought it might be. I knew it would be difficult, I knew it would be a challenge for me and they were the reasons that I decided to come across London. I could have stayed where I was and been comfortable, working with top players, challenging for trophies. I just felt to push myself as a coach for the next stage of our development this was an opportunity that was interesting."

Clarke and Zola played together at Chelsea for two seasons between 1996 and 1998, but Clarke says his relationship with Zola is no different than his relationship with Jose Mourinho or Avram Grant: "The professional relationship is the same. My job is assistant manager, my job is to give him as much help as I can, that's what I tried to do in the roles I had at Chelsea. Obviously I know Franco as a person better than I knew any of the rest of them.

"I try to coach the same, I bring the same methods and ideas and enthusiasm into the training here as I tried to install at Chelsea. I'm enjoying it, coming here has been good. I've enjoyed the challenge, working with different players — players who maybe haven't seen me working over the last four years and I think they have responded well to it."

West Ham welcome an Aston Villa side brimming with confidence to the Boleyn Ground this weekend, but Clarke believes the West Ham players, as evidenced by last Sunday's impressive 1–1 draw at Stamford Bridge, are beginning to find form. "I know it sounds silly but some of the training sessions have been excellent and we haven't managed yet to take those training performances on to the pitch yet, but given a period of time I think that will happen," Clarke said. "Hopefully the last game was a sign and an indication of the standards we can achieve on the pitch."

The cheery Zola and more taciturn Clarke seem like an odd mix, but Clarke says the Italian is attempting to instill more than Italian flair to the West Ham set-up: "When we started we said we'd try and smile everyday and if he can get me to smile everyday he's doing well."