Gianfranco Zola had BT Sport host Jake Humphrey squirming during their pre-match coverage of West Ham v Chelsea, when he chose to use some colourful language to describe his work ethic.
Former Chelsea player and West Ham manager Zola appeared with Joe Cole and Rio Ferdinand on the buildup to the game - with the two former England internationals finding Zola's choice of lanugage far funnier than Humphrey did.
Gianfranco Zola dispels "bullshit" rumours about his work ethic
Gianfranco Zola spent the prime of his career in the blue of Chelsea, and his first managerial job was with West Ham United, so it was only natural that BT Sport would call in his services for the Saturday lunchtime clash between the London rivals.
"An extraordinary individual effort!"#GoalOfTheDay is courtesy of Gianfranco Zola 🔵 pic.twitter.com/6Z7anKuSVd
— Premier League (@premierleague) July 12, 2017
Joe Cole and Rio Ferdinand both appeared alongside him, and both seemed humbled in the presence of Zola. Cole bemoaned that their respective times at Chelsea did not overlap, before Ferdinand urged BT to show a highlights reel of Zola's best Chelsea goals for any children watching from home.
When the BT Sport producers obliged and showed a montage of outstanding Gianfranco Zola brilliance, the Italian discussed his work ethic with Rio Ferdinand - using some colourful language in the process.
Ferdinand: None of this was accidental. Only through listening to people like Joe, Frank [Lampard], etc. who went to Chelsea and played alongside him like Frank did at Chelsea...they used to speak about your work ethic and practice. This wasn't by accident, was it?
Zola: No, no, it didn't come...they tell me 'it's natural' - sorry, forgive me the word, it's bullshit. Forgive me, it's a bad word - a strong word.
Ferdinand and Cole both broke into laughter at Zola's use of the word "bullshit", but host Jake Humphrey looked rather stressed, and hurried to apologise to any viewers who may have been offended by the Italian legend's language.
Perhaps the funniest part of the incident was the fact Zola chose to say the word even with the full knowledge that it shouldn't be done, and apologised either side of it.
Nonetheless, his insights into where his work rate came from, and the differences between football in England and Italy, were fascinating:
What I want to say is that everything is down to work and I used to spend at least one hour or one hour and 50 minutes every week on the fundamentals. Only by doing that I could get the good stats.
It's not just about scoring one every now and then. You have to know that if you get three free-kicks in a football match, you need to convert one. That one you convert is what makes you win or lose games.
This comes from Italy. When you play ten games at the top of the table, most of the time the games will be separated by a free-kick or a corner-kick. So, I always gave a lot of attention to them.
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