Upson sets himself World Cup target

Every day Matthew Upson has the same image in his head. "My goal is to play in the World Cup for England, that's my target," the central defender said yesterday. How often does he think about that? "Every day."

Upson has, finally, come a long way very quickly. Tomorrow, and with John Terry injured, and despite a less than convincing performance against Kazakhstan on Saturday, he is expected to line up for the World Cup qualifier away to Belarus. If selected it will be the 29-year-old's eighth cap – and his third under manager Fabio Capello, who regards the West Ham defender as someone who is willing to learn and adapt to his methods; an intelligent player who can follow instructions.

But Upson has also come a long way very slowly. He admits that, for years, he failed to capitalise on his "potential" at his first club, Arsenal, and had to journey through Reading and Birmingham City before establishing himself.

Injuries played a major part in that also but, Upson said, so did attitude. "Arsenal was a lesson for me," he said yesterday. "I think I left Arsenal having never touched the potential I had. I was a young lad and didn't really come through and do the things I knew I could do and I think that was to do with my mental approach. It didn't matter how hard I trained, all these other things weren't up to scratch and that's why. But over the last few years I've changed that approach and worked extremely hard and improved massively as a player."

A turning point was reached when, in 2003, he joined Birmingham. "I was relatively stagnant in my career, I was doing things the same as I'd always done," Upson said. "I had a bit of a realisation that if I really wanted to move on I'd have to sacrifice a bit more to my job and commit a bit more in certain areas. And I met somebody who could help me figure out how to go about that."

Upson started to work with Mike Griffiths, who styles himself as a "performance consultant" and has helped the player ever since. "It's about life experiencing, how to achieve something you want to achieve," Upson said. "I guess you do have to visualise it, you have to picture it. Most great things you do, you'll have pictured it before you've done it. So you'll start at the end, which is achieving it, and work backwards, on how do I get there?"

The end at the moment is the 2010 World Cup and Upson picturing himself playing for his country. To achieve that he has to take opportunities such as the one an injury to Terry presents. "I think you have to have belief," Upson said. "Previously when I joined up with the squad maybe I didn't believe I deserved to be here or be in the squad. I think that only ends up in one way – with poor performances. A lot of things have changed and I've become a far better player physically, mentally and more experienced and I feel ready for the challenge."

And set-backs. Upson accepts he did not perform as well as he would have liked against the Kazakhs but that he is better-equipped to deal with mistakes. He is also enjoying working with an Italian for country and – with Gianfranco Zola at Upton Park – club. "They bring a real tactical awareness to defending," he said. "It is one of the things they are renowned for. They are real experts in that field. It doesn't have to be particularly demanding work but it needs to be repetition and the habit of being in the right position and having the right shape, that's what they focus on."

Meanwhile, Rob Green, the squad's third-choice goalkeeper, has pulled out of the trip to Minsk because of soreness in his knee.

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