Taylor suffers injury setback

Defender's return to action is cut short

By Chris Burton   Last updated: 8th April 2008   Subscribe to RSS Feed

Taylor suffers injury setback

Taylor: Disappointed

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Martin Taylor has revealed his disappointment at picking up an abductor problem against Wigan.

The Birmingham centre-half was forced off after 72 minutes of the 2-0 defeat against the Latics, his first taste of action since his now infamous tackle on Arsenal striker Eduardo back in February.

He was filling in as the Blues' captain at the time following the dismissal of Damien Johnson, and admits that another spell on the sidelines is the last thing he needs having only just forced his way back into the reckoning.

Scan

"It was my groin, an abductor, tightened up," Taylor told the Birmingham Mail.

"I'm not sure what the severity of it is yet, we'll find out after a scan.

"I've had the problem before and it kind of comes from my hip rather than the groin itself. It just tightens up and I can't run it off, because if I run it off it tightens up even more and once you get to that point you are not doing the team any favours by staying on if you know you are running at 50 per cent of what you should be.

"I was disappointed with that because when you get back into the team the last thing you want is to be going off injured."

Positives

The defeat at the JJB on Saturday dented the Blues' battle against the drop, and Taylor accepts that they cannot rely on others dropping points if they want to maintain their Premier League status.

"We can't because if we had won we would have been seven points clear of Bolton," he said.

"But we've got a home game next and our home form has been really good. We've got to take the positives out of the last few home games.

"We need to have a look at Saturday and what went wrong, but also have a look at the last few home games and take the positives and confidence from them."

Assertive

Taylor's manager Alex McLeish felt that the defender acquitted himself well on his return to the first-team fold, but acknowledged that he was partially to blame for Wigan's crucial opening goal.

"I thought he did OK against two big, strong, quick centre-forwards," said McLeish.

"He played in the reserves on the Monday night before and he looked assertive enough in that game. I thought it was right to bring him back.

"It was just a shame the ball was on his right foot, his stronger foot, and for some reason he took it to the left foot and made a half-hearted clearance, from which they went up the pitch and scored. Otherwise I thought he did well."