'I wish I'd never signed for Liverpool - I never had connection like I did at Chelsea'

Joe Cole admitted his lack of connection with Liverpoolmeant he should never have joined the club after leaving Chelsea. The ex-Blues star, who spent seven years at Stamford Bridge, left west London in 2010 to sign for the Reds on a free transfer.

Despite the excitement surrounding his arrival at Anfield, it never clicked for Cole on Merseyside. He played just 42 games for the club before making a return to West Ham in 2013.

It was after re-signing for the Hammers that the former England international, 43, revealedjoining Liverpool in the first place was a mistakebecause he lacked the passion to represent the Premier League giants.

He said at the time: "I can only play for teams that I'm passionate about and I think that's what went wrong for me at Liverpool. I didn't feel a connection with the club or the place that I had at Chelsea and West Ham."

Discussing his media duties upon joining the club, he was told by the interviewer he was joining the biggest country in England - a sentiment Cole admitted he thought was false. "When I joined, the guy interviewing me said 'you've joined the biggest club in the country' and reeled off the trophies they'd won," he explained.

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"I just said 'yeah, if you put it like that, I suppose you're right' and Liverpool used that as the headline to the interview. I didn't want to upset anyone so I just went along with it. But obviously they're not the biggest club in the country any more," he said in 2013.

"How do you judge how big a club are? Nottingham Forest won the European Cup twice but they're not a bigger club than Chelsea." The TNT Sports pundit will be making a return to Stamford Bridge today as part of the Chelsea Legends squad who take on Liverpool FC Legends, with the proceeds of the match going to charity.

Cole will be lining up against several of his former Liverpool team-mates including Fabio Aurelio, Martin Skrtel and Pepe Reina. During his 2024 appearance on , hosted by ex-Chelsea team-mate John Obi Mikel, Cole revealed his horror knee injury in 2009 meant he was never the same player again for the rest of his career.

He said: "I was never the same player after that. I done everything, ACL, PCL, MCL and I was out for 11 months. My body was just failing me… I really wrecked myself. That’s how my body was after it."

On top of the absence of connection with Liverpool, Cole explained that moving abroad 15 years ago would have been the better decision in order to prolong his playing career. "I had a choice between Liverpool or Spurs because Arsenal pulled out and I just couldn’t go to Spurs," he continued.

"If I could have my time again, I would probably go, ‘No, you know what, wait.’ And I’d have gone abroad, somewhere hot, because playing in the heat actually helped my knee."

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