Darren Pratley is as eager as any to see Lyle Taylor back in action but warned Charlton fans not to put too much pressure on him as he returns from injury.

Taylor has been sidelined with a knee ligament injury since the end of August and his absence has been felt as the Addick’s have suffered a slump in form.

Unbeaten in their opening six fixtures, coincidentally Taylor played all six, the Addicks have gone on to lose ten of their following 15 ties.

The 29-year-old made his return last Saturday when he played 45 minutes in the 1-0 defeat Middlesbrough and featured late on in the home defeat by the same scoreline to Huddersfield on Tuesday as he finds his way back to fitness.

No win in nine and a run of four straight defeats have taken its toll on Lee Bowyer’s injury ravaged squad and Pratley admits he’ll be pleased when key figures such as Taylor and Jonny Williams, who are both expected to feature in Friday’s fixture against Hull, can return to the starting line-up.

“No matter how much you dress it up, losing games effects confidence,” he said.

“When you lose games it will affect you.

“We are all trying to make things happen and it’s not working, especially in front of goal, we aren’t creating, testing their keeper.

“The sooner we get everyone off that treatment table the better.

“Jonny is a creative player and Lyle scores goals, we need them back, they’re international players.

“It’s always good to have your best players available.”

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Taylor scored five goals at the start of the campaign before injuring himself while on international duty with Montserrat.

With 21 league goals last campaign Taylor was always going to be crucial in Charlton’s survival hopes, now back in full training Bowyer will hope he hits the ground running while Pratley warned there needed to be caution over how he’s eased back into the side.

“He’s not trained too much because of the schedule, but Lyle is Lyle, he’ll need games to get up to speed so we need to be patient.

“He won’t be as good as when he got injured right away.

“There’ll be two or three games when adrenaline will get him through but then he’ll hit a brick wall, and go through it again.

“It’s what happens after long term injuries.

“Lyle is old enough and experienced enough to know we need to be patient.”

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