After a topsy-turvy start to his professional career, Carlton Cole has flourished under West Ham United boss Gianfranco Zola - and hopes to do the same under another Italian, Fabio Capello, now he is a regular member of the England squad.
Apart from THAT pass against
Spurs,
Cole has been in impressive form and he plans to take it onto the international stage, if given the chance.
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Q: In what areas do you think you have improved?
A: I would put what happened with my career down to not concentrating, thinking life was going to be easy, and not being a professional basically. It's true I once turned up for a game at half time. I'm not proud of it.
All that's behind me now. I wasn't professional enough back then and didn't take my football seriously enough. That Carlton Cole was young and immature but now I've matured and I know what I want in life and I'm going to go for it.
Q: That recently-found maturity has certainly paid dividends, hasn’t it?
A: I've now come to terms with how to conduct myself off the field and on the field. Hopefully I can progress from now on, and all of what happened is in the past is gone. It's a new dawn for me and a chance to progress in my life.
I now take a DVD home after every game to see where I can improve. More times than not, even if people have said I've had a good game, I'll pick out the bad parts and say 'I can't do that again'. I'm more disappointed than happy after games because I want to improve.
Q: Was there a particular turning point for you?
A: There wasn't a particular incident that made me change. It was just basically growing up really. I think everyone comes to a point in their life where they feel they have to knuckle down.
I've seen I've got a big chance here to better myself and to make my family proud, make everyone who has had faith in me proud and try and progress in my life. That was the main point for me. Becoming a father last year also had a significant role to play in things as well.
Q: How much of an influence has Didier Drogba been for you?
A:
Didier Drogba is a brilliant player, a world class player. He's a more mature player than I am and I just need to look at the way he plays and hopefully become as good.
I don't want to be similar to him, but I want to be at that level where I'm confident in what I can do. Every time he goes onto the field he knows what he's going to do and he knows he's going to cause all these defenders havoc. So that's the level I want to get to.
Q: Sorry to bring up the back pass thing against West Ham – how have you responded to that?
A: Those things happen. It was an individual mistake, a moment of madness and I just know I won't be doing that again because I don't want to be feeling like that again, the feeling I experienced when I did it.
I just felt so gutted when the pass went to
Jermain Defoe. I knew it would go straight into the net once he took hold of the ball. He's given me banter about it and hopefully I can play him in like that for England now!
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