Wilfried Zaha Profile

Daz­et Wil­fried Armel Za­ha, born Abid­jan, Ivory Coast, Nov­ember 10, 1992. A product of The Crys­tal Pal­ace Youth Academy, Wil­fried Za­ha made his Foot­ball Lea­gue de­but for The Eagles in a 2-1 Cham­pi­on­ship de­feat ag­ainst Car­diff City at Sel­hurst Park on the 27th of Mar­ch 2010 and sig­ned a two-year pro­fes­sion­al con­tract wi­th the club the fol­low­ing month.

Af­ter amass­ing over 100 fir­st te­am ap­pear­ances for Crys­tal Pal­ace, Wil­fried Za­ha sig­ned a five-and-a-ha­lf-year con­tract wi­th Man­chester Uni­ted for an ini­tial trans­fer fee of £10 mil­lion on the 26th of Jan­uary 2013 be­fore the ded­ic­ated and hard work­ing right wing­er was loaned back to the Sel­hurst Park te­am for the re­mainder of the sea­son. Za­ha, who was Sir Al­ex Ferguson’s last sign­ing be­fore he an­nounced his re­tire­ment as head coach of Man­chester Uni­ted on the 8th of May 2013, was in­cluded in new man­ager Da­vid Moyes´s squad for the Old Traf­ford club´s pre-sea­son tour of the Far East and Aus­tralia in the sum­mer of 2013 , and the fe­ro­ciously fast flank for­ward de­b­uted for The Red Dev­ils as a sec­ond ha­lf re­place­ment for pre­vi­ous Welsh in­ter­na­tion­al Ry­an Gig­gs in a 1–0 friendly de­feat ag­ainst The Sing­ha All Stars at the Ra­jamangala Na­tion­al Sta­dium on the 13th of Ju­ly. The Abid­jan born play­er pro­ceeded to score his fir­st goal for Man­chester Uni­ted in a 2-2 friendly draw wi­th Ja­pan­ese Lea­gue Di­vi­sion One out­fit Cerezo Osa­ka at the Osa­ka Na­gai Sta­dium on the 26th of Ju­ly, and was han­ded his com­pet­it­ive de­but for the reign­ing Pre­mier Lea­gue cham­pi­ons in the 2–0 FA Com­munity Shield tri­umph ag­ainst FA Cup hold­ers Wi­gan Ath­let­ic at Wemb­ley on the 11th of August.

Za­ha made his fir­st Pre­mier Lea­gue ap­pear­ance for Man­chester Uni­ted in a 1-0 de­feat ag­ainst New­castle Uni­ted at Old Traf­ford on the 29th of Oct­ober but fou­nd it hard to es­tab­lish him­self in the fir­st te­am and was shipped out on loan to fir­st Ole Gun­nar Solskjaer´s Car­diff City, and then to for­mer club Crys­tal Pal­ace. As it all turned out, he sig­ned a per­man­ent deal wi­th the So­uth Lon­don si­de on the 2nd of Feb­ruary 2015, af­ter hav­ing made on­ly four fir­st te­am ap­pear­ances for Uni­ted. On the in­ter­na­tion­al sta­ge, he was han­ded his seni­or de­but for Eng­land by Roy Hodg­son when he entered the field as a late sec­ond ha­lf sub­sti­tute for fel­low de­butant Ra­heem Ster­ling in a 4-2 friendly loss to Swe­den at Friends Arena in Stock­holm on the 14th of Nov­ember 2012. Zaha´s sec­ond ap­pear­ance un­der Hodg­son came as a late sec­ond ha­lf re­place­ment for Ar­senal for­ward Theo Wal­cott in a 3-2 friendly win over Gor­don Strachan´s Scot­land at Wemb­ley on the 14th of Au­gust 2013, but he switched his in­ter­na­tion­al foot­ball al­le­gi­ance from Eng­land to the Ivory Coast on the 27th of Nov­ember 2016, and made his seni­or de­but for The Ele­phants in 2-1 friendly vic­tory ag­ainst no­ne oth­er than Swe­den at the Sheikh Za­yed Sta­dium in Abu Dh­abi on the 8th of Jan­uary 2017. Wil­fried Za­ha Play­ing Ca­reer: Crys­tal Pal­ace, Man­chester Uni­ted, Crys­tal Pal­ace, Car­diff City, Crys­tal Pal­ace. Manging Ca­reer: None.

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