Steve Parish: 'Manchester United held Wilfried Zaha back'

Crystal Palace chairman Steve Parish has claimed that Wilfried Zaha's spell at Manchester United set the player back in his football career.

The Eagles re-signed the 22-year-old for an undisclosed fee in January, having been acquired by Sir Alex Ferguson for United in 2013 for £15m then loaned back until the end of the 2012-13 campaign.

Zaha found first-team opportunities limited at Old Trafford and was loaned to Palace at the beginning of this season prior to completing a permanent return to Selhurst Park.

"It did not work for him up there and we came to a good arrangement with Manchester United," Parish told the Epsom Guardian.

"He's a great lad, and I would not say it has damaged him, but that experience of him going there and it not working out set him back a little bit. I don't know what happened up there, but it is certainly not all one-sided. There was a change of management just as he went there, Sir Alex bought him and he was not there when he arrived.

"There's been a bit of a maelstrom there over the past couple of years with the transition of the squad they had and Wilf got caught up in that a bit. There was no malice [from United] and they think he is a good player."

Zaha also spent the second half of last season on loan at Cardiff City.