Chelsea midfielder Joe Cole believes he's shaken off his show-boating tag.
After penning a new four-year contract yesterday, England star Cole reflected: "To be quite honest, my approach to life and what I want out of it has totally changed.
"Yes, it would be lovely to do great things here at the World Cup and for everyone to be talking about me.
"And yet these days I don't want in Baden-Baden to be a star. I just want to play football, get my nut down and do my best for the team.
"If there has been anything I have learned in my career, it's that life sometimes doesn't go quite according to plan.
"From a young age, there were enormous expectations of me. When I first broke into the West Ham side at the age of 17, there was all this talk about me becoming a world-class player.
"But I was just a boy then, both physically and mentally. I was even a stone lighter in those days.
"So I've learned a lot - and I had to do it in the public eye.
"And, yes, I got a lot of criticism. But, whatever happened, whatever anyone might have said, I never lost faith in my ability.
"So I trained hard and I got better. And I listened to people like Jose, Glenn Roeder, Sven and all the others I felt I could learn from.
"And I looked at players like David Beckham, Juan Sebastian Veron and Paolo Di Canio. And here I am at the World Cup, desperate to be part of a team that does something special."
