JOE COLE claimed there are “a lot of issues” that need to be addressed after England crashed out of the World Cup at the last 16 stage.

The former Chelsea midfielder was devastated after Fabio Capello’s side were beaten 4-1 by Germany in Bloemfontein.

But Cole is also adamant England “need to improve” if they are to make a bigger impression at major tournaments.

Cole said: “We have to look at ourselves as a group and we weren’t good enough from the start of the friendlies, the six games we’ve played, so it is back to the drawing board.

“I don’t know why this is. If I knew, I’d put it right. We will go away and start again but we have to address the problems that are there.

“It is not for me to talk to you guys about it but we need to just step up.

“We’re all in it together – everyone who has been involved with England from the qualifying campaign.

“We got to the last 16 of the World Cup. We got to the last eight last time so we need to improve.

“I am bitterly disappointed. There are a lot of issues. We wanted to do well and sometimes we just weren’t good enough, plain and simple.

“It is hard to say we were second best. No-one likes doing it but that’s life unfortunately. We came up against a team who were better than us.”

In terms of whether Capello should stay as coach, Cole said: “I think that’s a question for the manager.

“He is a great manager and we have got great players but there are issues we need to address but we’ve all got to stick together.

“We have such high expectations. We want to win the tournament and we didn’t do that.

“We do feel we have let ourselves down, the manager and the fans.”

Frank Lampard has called for the advent of goal-line technology after being denied a crucial equaliser as England crashed out of the World Cup to Germany.

England were trailing 2-1 when Lampard’s 20-yard strike hit the underside of the bar and bounced down around a yard over the goal-line.

But the match officials allowed play to continue and Germany eventually went on to win 4-1 - a scoreline Lampard believes flattered them.

The Chelsea midfielder said: “I haven’t seen the goal again but I didn’t need to see it again.

“I knew straight away that my shot was over the line, clearly a yard or so.

“It baffles me that it wasn’t given and it was a big deciding factor.

“I won’t stand here and say it is the reason why we got knocked out.

“But if it had gone to 2-2, and we had still come out and played the way we did in the second half, it would have been a different game.”

Lampard said: “I think it is time to bring in goal-line technology. We had a meeting before the World Cup when we were told about a million different rule changes that hardly affect the game.

“The big one, the one that affects the game today, hasn’t been brought in so it is a no-brainer.”

Lampard believes there were only small margins that separated the two sides.

He said: “Everyone can see, it was small things in the game.

“Everyone can see it was a goal which would have sent us in level at half-time and after the break we were on top and hit the bar again. Maybe we showed a bit of desperation and a little bit of naivety on our part in trying to push and push and getting caught on sucker punches on counter-attacks.

“It is the story of the game.

“Nobody can stand here and tell me Germany were a lot better than us. They were not 4-1 better than us.

“But the things have conspired against us and maybe we have conspired against ourselves at times. But it just didn’t go for us.”