Patrick Vieira responds to speculation on Wilfried Zaha's future
Crystal Palace manager Patrick Vieira says he hopes star forward Wilfried Zaha decides to stay at Selhurst Park beyond the summer.
The Ivory Coast international's contract expires in 2023 and talks between him and Palace have not progressed. 90min understands Zaha is ready to leave the Eagles for the second time in his career and is eager to find a team that can offer him Champions League football.
However, he is a Palace legend having nearly made 450 appearances for the club. He enjoyed his best goalscoring season in the Premier League in 2021/22, finding the net 14 times, and Vieira says he hopes Zaha decides to remain with his boyhood club.
He said: "Wilfried knows the position of the football club and the decision is going to be his. When he will be ready, we will listen to what he has to say.
"But everyone knows we want him to stay in our football club. We want to grow with Wilfried as one of our leaders, but the decision has to be his.
"The only focus at the moment is about how he has been training and how he is preparing himself to compete and to help the team to perform."
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Chelsea considered a move for Zaha last summer and Arsenal also have a long-standing interest. Marseille have made contact ahead of a pre-contract offer in January - the French side were eliminated in the group stages of the Champions League and have work to do to qualify again.
Fellow French sides Paris Saint-Germain and Monaco are interested, while Borussia Dortmund and RB Leipzig are also monitoring the situation.
