TalkingPoints

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Tomas Soucek of West Ham United celebrates with teammates after scoring the team's fifth goal during the Sky Bet Championship match between Lincoln City and West Ham United at the Gelder Group Sincil Bank Stadium in Lincoln, on October 14, 2026.

Mullins even kept future Champions League winner Javier Mascherano out of the starting XI during the Argentine’s brief spell at Upton Park in 2006.

Hayden Mullins reflects on his move from Crystal Palace to West Ham United

Mascherano was not the only future superstar Mullins would share a dressing room with, though. A young Ashley Cole joined him at Crystal Palace during a short but memorable loan spell at the turn of the Millennium.

Speaking on Gerryn Hussain’s The Players Lounge podcast, two-time Crystal Palace Player of the Year Mullins reflects on his reunion with Cole a few years later, and how one of the greatest left-backs of the 21st Century influenced his eventual departure from Selhurst Park.

“Palace was really tough to leave,” Mullins says. “I think there was a couple of factors in the reason why I wanted to go in the end. When I got the Player of the Year award, we had a young lad come on loan. I always remember it because I’ve gone into the room and we took a couple of players from Arsenal on loan, and one of them was a left-back.

“So I’ve gone in expecting to see this big [guy], because back then with [Arsene] Wenger, they had Patrick Vieira, Emmanuel Petit… big players. I was expecting to see this six-foot left-back!

“So I’ve gone in, got changed, there’s someone in there. But it’s like a small guy in the corner. So I’ve gone back out; ‘Where’s this left-back from Arsenal that we signed?’ It was Ashley Cole.”

Cole played 14 matches for a then-First Division Palace outfit in the 1999/20 season, a year after Mullins won the first of his two Player of the Year awards in Crystal Palace colours.

“Honestly, you’ve seen nothing like it. He would play the whole left side on his own! He would attack on his own, knock the ball around, go the other way, cross it, come back, defend. Couldn’t beat him. He was a machine, you know?,” Mullins recalls.

“And then the next season, Ash got in Arsenal’s first team, and I saw him playing in the FA Cup final and stuff. A couple of seasons after, I saw him, and we were talking. He was like, ‘How are you still at Palace? When I was there, you were like the main guy, blah, blah, blah…’

“And it hit me, do you know what I mean? And I’m thinking, this guy’s playing in the Champions League, he’s walking out in the Premier League, he’s winning titles and stuff. And I shared the dressing room with Ash. Brilliant guy, love him to death.

“But it was like one of them moments where it’s like someone slaps you in the face almost and goes, ‘Right, you know, you got this talent, but what are you doing?’ sort of thing.”

Mullins eventually got his Premier League chance at Upton Park

Ironically, Mullins would suffer play-off final heartbreak against Crystal Palace – who else? – just two years after he made the short trip across the capital. His decision to leave one London club for another would soon be justified, however, as West Ham finally secured their return to the Premier League in 2005.

“My contract was coming to an end at Palace, and Palace were in the Championship,” says a man who went on to represent Portsmouth, Birmingham City and Reading and now coaches Newport County in League Two. “West Ham had just come down from the Premier League at the time. They were in the Championship, but their squad, honestly, it was stacked.

“Michael Carrick was in midfield, played for England. Jermain Defoe played for England, playing up front. David James, England goalkeeper, was in there. A guy called Tomas Repka, who was the Czech captain I think, was in there. Christian Dailly, Scottish captain, was in there. Ian Pearce, Rob Lee… like, the squad was just stacked, you know? It was a proper, proper Premier League squad.

“And, yeah, I had a decision to make. I think Palace turned down a couple of bids at the time. I was on a free transfer at the end of the season, and I’d made them aware that I was going to leave. And then we eventually did the deal.

“The West Ham move for me at the time probably was one that was right. I had another offer from a Premier League club who told me to wait until the end of the season and they’d take me, but my decision there and then was to join West Ham and try and help them get back in the Premier League. And like I say, I looked at the squad and instantly knew it was somewhere where I wanted to go.

“Ash was like, ‘Yeah, you should be in the Premier League,’ and stuff like that. And, yeah, that was the moment where it really was like, ‘Yeah, maybe…'”