Ashley Cole says coaching Harry Kane and Cole Palmer gave him imposter syndrome

Ashley Cole has admitted questioning whether he was worthy of coaching the likes of Harry Kane and Cole Palmer during his early days in the England setup.

Cole is a full-time coach for the Three Lions and has previously served as assistant coach under interim manager Lee Carsley, while also having worked with the Under-21s.

Tasked with shaping some of the country’s best footballers, the former Chelsea and Arsenal left-back says he is aware of the fact many of these players are already coached by world-renowned managers at their clubs, making him anxious about whether he should be in the position to tell them how to play.

In an interview with The Telegraph, he said: “Even when you are talking to Under-21s you are still talking to players who are coached by Pep Guardiola, and all these top managers, so you do have to find some confidence and authenticity. You can shrink.

“There were times I was thinking, ‘I am telling Cole Palmer that’s not good enough but Pep allows him to do it’. It’s that connection and finding that relationship with the players.”

He added that his greatest thrill was seeing players of such calibre do what he had asked of them.

“They have been coached by top managers,” he said. “Now I am saying to them, ‘That is not enough, you’ve got to do this’. And they were amazing towards me. They were trying to work me out – do I know what I am talking about?

“Everything I spoke to them about in the team meetings I saw on the pitch. I’m telling Harry Maguire to do this and I’m telling Harry Kane to do that. To see it (on the pitch) was amazing for my confidence.”

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Cole says he has matured from the days that saw him regularly in the headlines for his off-pitch antics, adding: “I am not saying what I did was right. I acted like an idiot at times but I was a kid.

“We have all made mistakes and 20 years down the line we are telling our kids, ‘Don’t do that’. It really made me understand life, people, respect, in a different way. I have come out of that bubble. I have just matured. My drive is something different.”

And now, he wants people to put his playing career second as he embarks on making a real name for himself as a coach.

“I want people now to say, ‘Ashley Cole, the coach’,” he said. “Not, ‘Ashley Cole, the footballer’. It has been quite hard but I think I have done enough on the training pitch.

“Ashley Cole the player is done. But Ashley Cole the coach, he is doing alright, or whatever it looks like.”