The Hammers conceded the first goal after barely a minute and then went on to conceed a first half penalty that was converted on the rebound typically by Steven Gerrard.
Despite this Zola believes the Hammers matched the title contenders for most of the game. "I don't think on the pitch there was a big difference," Zola told the official site.
"The first half probably we played better than them. The quality of the passing was good, but 2-0 was too much really.
"I can't be too hard on my players as they played a good game, all the time very high-quality football but it is just teams like