Wolves to miss injured Kightly

Wolves winger Michael Kightly is facing up to eight weeks on the sidelines after manager Mick McCarthy revealed he is likely to need an ankle operation.

The 23-year-old visited a specialist today after being forced off half an hour into Sunday's 1-0 home defeat to Birmingham, with scans indicating he will have to go under the knife.

McCarthy said: "He's had a scan and it looks like he'll need an operation which would be six to eight weeks out."

The news comes as a blow to Wolves, with Kightly impressing of late after a troubled start to the campaign following hip and foot surgery, but McCarthy accepts the prognosis is not as bad as it could have been.

"The way he went over and rolled his ankle apparently he's quite lucky and it could have been worse," he said.

"We've not really had Michael at his full potential yet and Sunday was the first time we'd maybe seen that and then he picks up a new injury.

Disappointing

"It's really disappointing for him because he wants to play and he thought he was somewhere at it.

"He was really down about it all yesterday but today he's brightened up because it looks like being six to eight weeks.

"That's almost good news in terms of what could have happened."

Meanwhile, McCarthy concedes Wolves are suffering from a crisis of confidence but admits there is no magic formula to restore belief in his players.

Wolves turned in one of their most inept performances of the campaign in the defeat by local rivals Birmingham at Molineux.

They have now gone eight Barclays Premier League games without a win since mid-September and are four points adrift of the safety zone.

Wolves face a crunch home clash with fellow strugglers Bolton on Saturday and McCarthy is aware his side have to compete in a way they did not during the first half against Blues.