Premier League - Zola wins on West Ham debut

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Gianfranco Zola got the perfect start as West Ham manager as his side beat Newcastle United 3-1 in the Premier League at Upton Park.
  














The Italian profited from two first-half goals by his compatriot David Di Michele, before Matthew Etherington added a third after the break.
Newcastle captain Michael Owen pulled one back, but by that time the game was out of reach for the visitors.
A vibrant display made good on Zola's pledge to bring style back to West Ham, even if the team's appearance got them off to a rocky start.
They appeared last weekend with a patch of material over their now-defunct sponsor's logo.
This weekend they went one better, sporting white rectangles on their chests bearing the players' shirt numbers.
The effect was to make the Hammers's attire look better suited to a school sports day than the Premier League.
Alan Curbishley narrowly 'beat' Newcastle's Kevin Keegan when he became the first manager to lose his job this season.
Now the West Ham players looked dressed for a very different kind of sack race.
But the sartorial catastrophe was forgotten inside eight minutes when Di Michele supplied the perfect start thanks to a combination of skill and luck.
He jinked his way past three challenges before shooting left-footed from the edge of the box.
The ball hit defender Steven Taylor and ricocheted into the ground, before looping up and over the stranded Shay Given.
Newcastle, coached by Chris Hughton in the absence of a permanent manager, hit back with plenty of possession but no penetration.
Geremi showed signs of life down the right flank, as did Charles N'Zogbia down the left, but Owen and Xisco lacked sharpness up front.
Damien Duff had a penalty shout turned down after his cross hit Scott Parker's arms, but Newcastle failed to test goalkeeper Robert Green.
It was two on 37 minutes, when Di Michele went through one-on-one and saw his shot parried by Given.
But the ball came back to him, he lifted it past a flailing defender, and drilled a low volley into the bottom-right corner.
Fortune smiled on the Hammers again in the 53rd minute, when some spectacularly lax defending saw Di Michele go clean through down the right channel.
He went for his hat-trick right-footed, but dragged his shot across the face of goal. However, there was no defender on hand to clear and the ball fell straight to Etherington who tapped in from close range.
Midway through the second half Owen gave Newcastle a glimmer of hope with a superb finish.
He collected an N'Zogbia pass, shifted the ball into a foot of space and curled his shot past Green into the far corner. Vintage Owen.
Claudio Cacapa and Duff then gave Green further work to do, but West Ham weathered the storm to get their Italian revolution off to a flier.