Taylor: Sven apology will have put players back onside

Players’ union chief Gordon Taylor believes the England team will still give their backing to manager Sven-Goran Eriksson despite his indiscreet remarks about some of them to an undercover reporter.

The Swede made unhelpful comments about David Beckham, Michael Owen, Rio Ferdinand, Wayne Rooney and Shaun Wright-Phillips to the News of the World reporter, who was posing as an Arab sheikh with a view to invest in the English game.

Taylor, the chief executive of the Professional Footballers Association, insists an apology will have been all it would take for the players to move on and forget about the incident.

“The players he mentioned will have felt uncomfortable, and the stuff about Rio, Michael, Wayne and Shaun was a little bit ‘ouch’,” he told the Daily Telegraph.

“But they know what happened to Sven could have happened to them.

“Most of the players in Sven’s squad have been set up by the press at some point. So there will be a sense of sympathy and understanding – with the right apology.

“Footballers get a lot more than that thrown at them. The players will say ‘OK, fair enough, you’ve apologised, I am glad you have made the effort’.”