• Premier League

Jol dismisses Zamora criticism as 'sour grapes'

ESPN staff
October 5, 2012
Bobby Zamora's attitude at Fulham has been questioned by Martin Jol © Getty Images
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Fulham manager Martin Jol has hit back at his former striker Bobby Zamora after the player claimed that "the vast majority'' of the West London club's players do not get on with him.

Zamora, 31, moved to Queens Park Rangers in January amid reports of a frosty relationship with Jol. The striker confirmed that had been the case this week, and went a step further when suggesting most of his former team-mates shared his feelings.

However, Jol responded: "It is probably sour grapes. I think nothing is what it seems.

"Everyone knows me. The players know me so one player will say this, another player will say that. It doesn't matter. I don't care. For me, the most important thing is we get the results so you will have to ask the players. If they do well and work hard, I try to get a good relationship with them. If not, I don't.

"Insiders here know that this probably started after two weeks of me being here. There was a few leaks in the paper and I asked him and he said: 'No, it wasn't me'. I knew it was him and his agent 100%. He said: 'No, it wasn't me. I hate the press'. He hated defence and later said he hated crosses as well and that was the moment I thought 'maybe it is better to sell' and that is what we did.''

Zamora was followed out of the club this summer by a number of key players, including Mousa Dembele, Clint Dempsey, Danny Murphy, Andrew Johnson and Dickson Etuhu.

However, Jol was quick to deny the exits were down to a problematic relationship with any of the players.

"If you take Clint Dempsey, it is different from Mousa Dembele," he said. "Mousa was phoning me after his move and thanking me for everything. Every player is different. Clint wanted to move so then the relationship would not be great. Danny Murphy I wanted to keep so ask him. There were no issues at all.

"With Bobby it started after a couple of weeks. Everybody knew and now he has moved on. I don't think it is typically English to make comments after a year or eight months.

"We moved on and it was not easy because I had to get another No. 9. We did because (Pavel) Pogrebnyak scored as many goals in a couple of weeks as my other strikers did in six months. Later we got (Dimitar) Berbatov, who was probably our best signing ever, so people who know us, know Fulham and know me, knew it was quite a challenge here. In hindsight, you could say we managed to do well.''

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