Ashley Cole would enjoy plenty of high points during his 107-cap England career, but one of his lows came at the end of the Three Lions’ Euro 2012 quarter-final clash against Italy.
England had held the Azzurri to 120 goalless minutes in Kyiv, meaning that their dreams of ending international football’s most famous trophy drought rested on a penalty shootout.
The Three Lions had lost their last four shootouts, and when Cole missed from the spot, it meant their wretched record continued.
Ashley Cole on his Euro 2012 penalty shootout miss
For Cole, the misery of his decisive miss was heightened by the fact that he had faced a similiar high-pressure spot kick just weeks earlier and duly converted. That came in Moscow, where Chelsea won their first-ever Champions League title by defeating Bayern Munich on spot-kicks, with Cole stepping up to score the Blues’ fourth penalty.
“I was disappointed because two or three weeks beforehand, I’d scored in the shootout against Bayern Munich in the Champions League final,” Cole recalls to FourFourTwo. “So missing killed me.”
While Cole was never a regular penalty taker for his club, he never shied away from the responsibility in shootouts.
“I was confident taking penalties,” he continues. “I thought, ‘OK, it’s just another penalty.’”
But as he stood over the ball against Italy and looked to legendary Azzurri goalkeeper Gianluigi Buffon, a seed of doubt was sewn.
“In the Italy game, I changed my mind,” he admits. “I knew that Buffon would have watched the Champions League final – he told me afterwards that he had watched it.
“I should have gone down the middle, but I tried to whip it and go the same way again.”
Buffon would duly make the save, leaving West Ham midfielder Alessandro Diamanti free to slot home the winning penalty.
“It was devastating,” Cole adds, almost a decade and a half on. “But it is what it is – you can’t score them all, I’m not the only one who’s missed a penalty.
“I’m saying that flippantly, but I held a lot on my shoulders for not helping the team to get through.”
Could It Be Coming Home? with Joe Cole and Ashley Cole is brought to you by Carling, official sponsor of the Emirates FA Cup and Adobe Women’s FA Cup. Watch the show on YouTube and Spotify, or listen to it wherever you get your podcasts
