ZAHA GETS A PAT ON BACK FOR BATTLING

CRYSTAL PALACE boss Patrick Vieira believes Wilfried Zaha has learned to take the rough stuff in his stride.

But he still wants his star man to get angry when defenders go too far – and punish them with goals and assists.

“I’m against protecting players,” Vieira said.

“Challenges are part of the game.

“And Wilf, or any other players with his quality, have to deal with it.

“But at the same time I don’t want him to lose that fire that he has. That is who he is as a player and a person.

“I want him to keep that fire and to bounce back, go and play and hurt them even more.”

Palace face Southampton today at St Mary’s, where Zaha was sent off three seasons ago.

First he reacted to a foul by Saints’ England midfielder James Wardprowse and then he sarcastically applauded referee Andre Marriner (top) for showing him a yellow card.

Vieira pointed to the Ivory Coast winger’s selfcontrol in Palace’s goalless draw at home to Leeds last Monday as proof that he has matured since then.

“Leeds were quite smart because different players were making fouls on him all the time,” said Vieira (below).

“You could see that was a plan for them.

“Teams try to make him lose his control because of the talent, how he can hurt them. He has the experience now to manage it better.

“When you have talent you have to expect that kind of challenge.

“After three or four fouls he needed to react and he did, but in a good way.

“It still hurts but he needs to understand why they are doing it.

“We still have to talk about it but the majority of the time he deals really well with it,

“And I have been really happy with the way he manages himself.

“He was quite sore after that game against Leeds.

“But again the only thing that he can do is control himself and play as well as he can.

“The other stuff has to be taken care of by the referee.”