West Ham’s Joe Cole: I didn’t feel a connection with Liverpool

Joe Cole has revealed that he did not feel he had a “connection” with Liverpool after signing for the club three years ago.

The 31-year-old midfielder failed to hold down a starting spot and Anfield and sealed a return to West Ham United in the January transfer window.

And the former England international, who was loaned out to Ligue 1 side Lille last season, admits that he did not feel comfortable on Merseyside.

“I can only play for teams that I’m passionate about and I think that’s what went wrong for me at Liverpool,” the Sun quotes Cole as saying.

“I didn’t feel a connection with the club or the place that I had at Chelsea and West Ham.

“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. 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. 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.”