The Manchester Evening News have been forced to issue an apology to Gianfranco Zola after they claimed the United manager had tapped up Manchester City striker Valerie Bojinov.
The MEN carried a story back in January claiming that Bojinov had been contacted by Hammers boss Zola to ask if he was interested in a move to West Ham United - something furiously denied at the time by the Irons boss.Since the story was published West Ham's recently appointed lawyers threatened the newspaper with legal action should they refuse to issue an apology. That apology was published in today's copy of the Evening News, and read:
"On 14 January 2009, we published an article which claimed, wrongly, that Gianfranco Zola had telephoned Manchester City's Bulgarian striker Valeri Bojinov and asked him to play for West Ham United, despite Manchester City having made it clear that they do not want to sell him. This would have been contrary to Premier League rules.
"We accept that this allegation was incorrect and we apologise unreservedly to Gianfranco Zola for the the embarrassment caused by the article."
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