Lyle Taylor: My wait for a goal annoyed me – and why Charlton Athletic can’t try and canter into the League One play-offs

BY RICHARD CAWLEY

richard@slpmedia.co.uk

Lyle Taylor has rejected any talk that Charlton Athletic will take their foot off the gas – with their League One play-off spot close to being assured.

The striker bagged his 13th goal of the campaign in Saturday’s 2-1 win over Portsmouth at The Valley.

The Addicks are eight points clear of seventh-placed Peterborough United and can extend their unbeaten home run to 13 matches when they face Burton Albion tonight.

But Taylor dismissed talk that Charlton might ease up and canter into the end-of-season knockouts.

The striker said: “No, because regardless of whether we make the top two or the play-offs, we have to carry momentum into it. I know from my time at Wimbledon when we went unbeaten for eight or nine games and went from nowhere – 12th or 13th – to seventh [in League Two].

“We carried momentum and we were never going to lose in the play-offs. Momentum is the biggest thing in football, and belief. You’re only going to get that from going out and dominating games, like we dominated today [Saturday].”

Taylor was back on the scoresheet for the first time since January 12, although that barren spell was not aided by a retrospective three-game ban from the ill-tempered game against Accrington Stanley.

“Because we had no Tuesday games during my suspension it felt like I was out for six years,” said the Montserrat international. “It’s only been four games since I last scored but those four games have been two months.

“It’s been an annoying one for me. I had [George] Lapslie block one on the line at Wimbledon and I hit the post at Doncaster – I had a message today on Instagram or Twitter, I can’t remember which, saying today’s the day it goes in the back of the net. It worked out that way. But Igor [Vetokele] blocked one from Josh [Cullen].

“The whole point was to perform [against Portsmouth]. We performed under massive, massive pressure and got the points. We’ve got 10 games left and we’ve got an outside chance [of automatic] – but an outside chance is a chance, so why not?”

Jonny Williams and Krystian Bielik both came off with hamstring injuries and look set to miss the visit of the Brewers.

“We have to go out with the same intensity,” said Taylor. “There are not many teams that will be able to match us. We went out there knowing that physically Portsmouth run over teams and we stood up to that. When we got the ball we dominated them and outplayed them.”