Joe Cole loved his time at Chelsea, but the retired attacker cannot get over one thing surrounding his exit.
During his time in west London, Cole won three Premier League titles before departing for Liverpool in 2010.
The way his departure was announced has left a little bit of a bitter taste in the 44-year-old’s mouth, though.
Even so, despite that and Jose Mourinho’s tough love towards Cole, again, he enjoyed his spell at Chelsea and had plenty of reasons to.
Joe Cole working as a pundit at a Premier League match.
Photo by James Gill – Danehouse/Getty Images
Joe Cole unhappy with how Chelsea confirmed his departure
Chelsea announced Cole’s exit by simply adding his name to a list of released players, which also included talent from the club’s academy.
That did not go down well with the ex-England international, who felt he deserved a bit more after his years of service to the English giants.
Speaking on The High Performance Podcast, Cole said: “Do you know what really hurt? I’m not sentimental about things or anything like that, but what actually hurt was you’ve been at the club for seven years, you know, and given everything, you won trophies, and I’m very like, well, that should be enough, you know, I didn’t want a big fanfare, but you know, when they just put you in like the players that they released from the Academy in the list, like Michael Ballack, you know, I think clubs are a lot better than that now, do you know what I mean?”
“Just like a statement saying the following players will leave the club? Yeah, just a part of that. With four or five young players who’d never even kicked a ball for the club.”
As the former Chelsea star touched on, Ballack also left Stamford Bridge the same summer, rejoining Bayer Leverkusen.
Like Cole, the German has also done some punditry since retiring. However, Ballack is also advising Bayern Munich’s Lennart Karl, who is thought to be attracting interest from Chelsea.
Michael Ballack, Frank Lampard and Joe Cole at Chelsea FC Annual Lunch
Photo by Chelsea Football Club/Chelsea FC via Getty Images
A look at Joe Cole’s final season at Chelsea
Before leaving Chelsea in 2010, Cole was able to help the club win their third Premier League title.
In the run-in, he scored a big goal against Chelsea’s title rivals Manchester United as the Blues went on to beat Sir Alex Ferguson’s side 2-1 at Old Trafford. All in all, it was not a bad way to leave the team.
Joe Cole’s final season at Chelsea Appearances Goals Assists
Premier League 26 2 6
Champions League 5 0 0
FA Cup 5 0 2
League Cup 3 0 2
Total 39 2 10
Clearly, though, Cole is still unhappy with his exit announcement, which is more than understandable. After his service to the club, he deserved more than just an inclusion on a list.
It is not something that you see much of these days, though, so Chelsea should not be upsetting any more of their players for that reason.