The 22-year-old says he has been injured for seven months after his £6million transfer from Preston North End and believes that he was mistaken for thinking he could play through the pain before he finally had an operation to repair a hernia last month.

He is now back in the Portsmouth squad and, despite still being without a Barclays Premier League goal, Nugent is ready to fight for a place in the first team as Pompey look to reach the FA Cup final with a semi-final against West Bromwich Albion at the start of next month.

Nugent has started only seven first-team matches - and only four in the Premier League - and was back on the substitutes' bench for Saturday's 2-0 defeat at Tottenham Hotspur.

Nugent explained: "I've been playing since the start of the season with an injury. I've got it sorted out now and hopefully can start making an impression.

"It's just been wear and tear of the groin but it has stopped me doing myself justice for Portsmouth. I even had pain at the end of last season's England Under-21 European Championship run but I thought I could play through it."

He added: "I just took painkillers and hoped for the best but that proved a bad decision. In the end I had to have the operation. It's taken a long time to recover but now I can say it feels fine - and I've got the buzz again.

"I just need a few games now and hopefully I can get involved in some for the first team before the season ends."