Joe Cole reveals why Jimmy Bullard ‘had to leave’ West Ham and why he was so unlucky

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Jimmy Bullard was really a victim of timing more than anything else, as Joe Cole reflects on their time together in the West Ham United reserves.

A boyhood Hammers fanatic, the set-piece specialist turned Soccer AM co-host would never make a first-team appearance for his beloved side.

Ever the optimist and as cheeky as a chappy can be, Jimmy Bullard is not the type to let himself worry about what might have been. Yet, Joe Cole cannot help but feel sympathy for a man who earned three England call-ups but zero caps, and also left West Ham United after two years and no senior outings.

Cole rejected Sir Alex Ferguson and Manchester United in order to make his breakthrough in claret and blue. Frank Lampard turned down Arsenal and Tottenham in favour of the Hammers.

Michael Carrick was there too, three future Premier League champions all rising through the ranks as part of the same ‘Golden Generation’.

Had Cole accepted Sir Alex’s offer, had Lampard opted not to follow in his father’s claret and blue footsteps, Bullard might well have made the grade. Or, failing that, he would stepped onto the hallowed Upton Park turf in a home kit at least once.

Joe Cole explains why Jimmy Bullard was so unfortunate at West Ham United

Speaking on Mo Gilligan’s Beginning, Middle and End podcast, Cole feels that Bullard was just unlucky that his own emergence came when there was so much competition for a first-team berth in the centre of the park.

Bullard, of course, would go on to enjoy a fine top-flight career, if not at the same level as Cole, Lampard or Carrick.

The poodle-haired prankster inspired Wigan Athletic to promotion and then a top-half finish. Chris Coleman said at Fulham that he was ‘the best £2million we’ve ever spent’. And even during an injury-hit spell at Hull City he was still responsible for one of the most iconic celebrations in modern Premier League history.

“He’s nuts! I love Jimmy. I sat next to him in the dressing room and, let me tell you, it can be fun but it can also be a pain in the backside,” Cole recalls, insisting that the madcap personality that made Bullard such a hit in front of the TV cameras was there right from those youth-team days.

“Honestly, I love him. One day, for some reason, I decided I am going to squirt him with the fire extinguisher. Thinking, ‘I’ll get you once’. And then every day for six weeks, he’s doing it to me!

“Do you know what, Jimmy would have come through at West Ham but he had me, Michael Carrick, Frank Lampard [all ahead of him].

“He had to leave to go to Peterborough [on a free transfer in 2001], and he ended up becoming a Premier League player and getting in the England squad. Yeah, we had a really good group of young midfielders.

“[Former Swansea ace] Liam Britton as well. Five [future] Premier League players all playing in midfield in that three or four year spell at West Ham.”

Bullard would reveal what Harry Redknapp told him

There are similarities, perhaps, between Cole and Bullard. Two mercurial, often magical talents who, from a technical level alone, stood head and shoulders above many of their peers. Perhaps, if those injury issues had not interrupted Bullard when he was in his prime and on the verge of an England cap, he would have joined Cole in representing one of the division’s truly elite sides.

“A little bit gutted,” Bullard told Four Four Two magazine a few years ago, when discussing how his departure from Upton Park came about.

“I had a lot of mates there and felt I could have held my own in the first team, but I don’t think holding your own was enough for Harry [Redknapp]. He wanted someone who was going to set up two goals a game.

“We left on great terms. I said, ‘I’ll prove you wrong one day, Harry,’ and he said, ‘I hope you do, Jim. Good luck.’ And away I went to Peterborough.”

West Ham can leapfrog Fulham this weekend as Joe Cole talks up Nuno impact

In the present, two of Bullard’s former clubs are facing up to what could be a tense battle against the drop. West Ham, at least, can approach this weekend’s trip to AFC Bournemouth with a renewed sense of positivity after two successive wins.

Fulham, in contrast, have lost five of their last six. West Ham can leapfrog the Cottagers if they beat Bournemouth and Marco Silva’s side slip up against high-flying Sunderland.

Joe Cole is fully behind Nuno Espirito Santo now, those victories over Newcastle and Burnley showcasing the resilience required to keep the wolf from the door.

“Before the weekend, I didn’t think [West Ham] had a chance of staying up,” Cole told talkSPORT recently.

“But they showed me something. Nuno showed me something at the weekend. [Now] I think they have a chance.”

“I think Wolves are doomed and there are five teams [in trouble]. Two of them will go through the trapdoor,” adds Cole, a two-time Premier League champion with Chelsea.

“I worry for West Ham, but there’s more of a light after the weekend.”