Michael Owen has admitted that going to the World Cup in Germany in 2006 with England was a mistake.
The 29-year-old had just 20 minutes of action under his belt going into the tournament due to a matertarsal injury picked up when he collided with then Tottenham goalkeeper Paul Robinson on New Year's Eve 2005.
The Newcastle striker played in all three warm-up games prior to the tournament, but during the opening exchanges of the third group game against Sweden Owen suffered a serious knee injury which kept him out for 10 months.
Since then the former Liverpool ace has played just 52 league games for the Magpies in the close to three seasons since the World Cup.
"There is no hiding from the fact that injuries have been the bane of my time at Newcastle," he told the Journal.
"It is frustrating. However, and people will probably laugh, but I know I'm not injury-prone.
"If you look at my time at Newcastle, the problems started when Paul Robinson landed on my foot against Tottenham just after Christmas.
"Loads of people get metatarsal injuries but they are normally not as bad as mine. Nobody's foot would not have broken in that situation.
"I then rushed my preparations for the World Cup. I played half a game for Newcastle.
"After being in plaster for so long, my leg was de-conditioned and with hindsight, I should never have gone to Germany with England.
"It's easy to say that now, but if I had my time again, I would still have gone because it was a World Cup.
"I'm not thinking what could have been, but with hindsight, my leg was half as strong as it should have been.
"Muscles support limbs and I twisted my knee awkwardly and that was it. All that came from someone landing on my foot, so I don't think it's my fault."
Owen made his return from his latest injury, an ankle ligament problem which forced him to miss five games, in the 1-1 draw at Hull City on Saturday and knows that he needs to hit form immediately to fire Newcastle to safety.
The frontman, whose contract runs out at the end of the season, comes back into a team who have slipped closer to the drop zone in recent weeks with just goal difference keeping them out of the bottom three.
"The one thing I have got a history of is taking one or two games to get into my stride again, but we haven't got time for me to do that," he said.
"Hopefully my eye is in straight away and I start knocking the goals in again immediately."
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