I got it to work somewhat
i compiled a u-boot-sunxi-with-spl.bin (orangepi_zero) with CONFIG_SPI_BOOT=y and compiled the sunxi-tools from apritzel's spiflash branch and succesfully flashed the u-boot image to the NOR flash via USB OTG
copied Armbian 5.32.170915 (nightly) to a 8gb USB 3.0 with Etcher, plugged the USB into the opi-zero and turned it on
the green LED comes on fairly quickly, the ethernet leds flash as well but it takes a couple power-on's for me to get the heartbeat from the red LED and i can connect over SSH but the system seems unstable and sluggish
Could it be the power? i tried 2 different 5V power supplies and the USB 3.0 ports of my PC and it doesn't seem any different