Fulham’s born-again goalkeeper Maik Taylor will post his CV in the shop window tomorrow as the Cottagers bid to beat Burnley and clinch their place in the quarter-finals of the FA Cup.
Northern Ireland international Taylor made just one league appearance in 16 soul-destroying” months after Edwin van der Sar’s £7million arrival from Juventus in August 2001.
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Fulham keeper Maik Taylor |
The 31-year-old has been back between the sticks since his Dutch rival broke the fourth metatarsal in his right foot when fouling Newcastle’s Alan Shearer on December 21.
Van der Sar will not return for at least another month – but Taylor knows he will then immediately be relegated to the bench so is determined to impress potential suitors in tomorrow’s Loftus Road tie against the mid-table First Division side.
“This is my opportunity to show people what I’m capable of,” he said. “It’s my chance to prove to people what I can do.
“Fulham are aware that, if an opportunity comes along that’s right for everyone, I’d like to go and play first-team football.”
Taylor was in the Army for eight years before joining Farnborough in 1995 and soon moving on to Barnet and Southampton.
It was at Fulham where he really established himself, missing just two games in three years as the Londoners stormed into the top flight.
But van der Sar’s arrival changed all that – and asked if life without first-team football felt soul-destroying, Taylor admitted: “Definitely, it’s been extremely difficult to take and very frustrating.
“A lot of people doubted I could play in the Premiership. I always believed I could, so I was bitterly disappointed when – having worked so hard to help Fulham get there – it was taken away from me.
“But Edwin’s a world-class keeper and one of the most consistent performers in the team.
“The quality of keeper he is makes it slightly easier to bear. If he wasn’t in the top three or five in the world, it’d be much, much harder for me to accept.”
Taylor, out of contract this summer, revealed that only manager Jean Tigana’s insistence that he stayed and the club’s high valuation of him had prevented him leaving already.
“When the manager brought Edwin in, he gave me his reasons why he’d done so and asked me to give him at least one good year, because he felt he needed two keepers,” he said.
“There was interest in me but the club basically said they needed me here for at least another year.
“I had two years left on my contract and they weren’t prepared to let me go.
“After the first year, I sat down with the club and said ’I’m an international and need to be playing regularly.’
“And there were some offers last summer, but Fulham wanted more money for me than I hoped they would, which put the blocks on things. Now we’ll see what happens in the future.”
One encounter Taylor remembers from the days when he was Fulham’s first-choice shot-stopper is a tumultuous battle with Burnley.
“I remember in the Second Division, we’d just won the championship and played them with five or six games remaining,” he said.
“They gave us a standing ovation coming out of the tunnel – but by half-time, we’d had three players carried off.
“And they won’t have changed as Stan Ternent demands 110% from his players.
“They’re a very big, physical, powerful team and have proved that, on their day, they can beat Premiership opposition.
“But if we match their physical side of the game, hopefully our quality will come through.”