Chinese Super League outfit offer Zaha £44m to leave Crystal Palace

Crystal Palace are bracing themselves for a January bid for Wilfried Zaha from Chinese Super League side Dalian Yifang, claims The Daily Mail.

Yifang are prepared to make Zaha one of the best-paid players on the planet by offering the Ivory Coast international minimum wages of £44m after tax over a four-year contract.

Zaha has developed into arguably the best player in the Premier League outside those playing for the ’top-six’ clubs and has previously been heavily linked with a move to Tottenham and Chelsea.

Palace have managed to fend off interest from their Premier League rivals in the past and will now have to battle interest from China next month.

Yifang, who boast players like Nicolas Gaitan and Yannick Carrasco, are willing to pull out all the stops to land Zaha in January.

The Chinese Super League side are willing to triple Zaha’s current salary and even provide first-class travel to enable the 26-year-old to return to the UK whenever he wants.

Zaha only signed a new long-term deal at the start of the season and Palace will surely turn down any offer given his importance to the club and their hopes of beating the drop.

Without a striker Roy Hodgson can trust, the former England manager has been forced to deploy Zaha out of position in a central berth all season.

Zaha has returned three goals in 15 league appearances but is easily the Eagles’ most influential player and losing him would be a hammer blow to their chances of beating the drop.

In fact, since the start of last season Palace have only won 7.7% of Premier League matches Zaha has not started compared to a win ratio of 34.9% of matches he has featured from the off.