IN the opening quarter of an hour of Middlesbrough's midweek Capital One Cup tie at Swansea, George Friend had the opportunity to go on the overlap down the left flank.

If he had stuck to orders, he would have stayed sensible and held a strong defensive line. The orders were designed to keep the Swans winger Nathan Dyer at bay, but also out of precaution for the Boro left-back's hamstring.

It was Friend's first appearance since he tore the muscle in the 1-0 defeat at Cardiff City on November 17. Back ahead of schedule, Boro's head physiotherapist Chris Moseley was wary of doing too much too soon.

Friend had never encountered such a hamstring problem before in his career, so he was ready to adhere to the plan. But then he nipped ahead of Dyer, played a ball inside for Grant Leadbitter and the chance to charge down the line opened up in front of him.

"I knew Nathan Dyer would be a handful, so I was more than happy to stick to orders, but I couldn't help myself. I had an early chance to run forward and I wanted to do it - test it out," said Friend.

"I felt OK afterwards too. I was nervous about the injury, what it would hold up like, because I had never had a hamstring tear before. The physio told me to sit back a bit more than normal and I agreed with him. Then that happened!"

Friend's runs from deep have become a trademark of his in a Middlesbrough shirt this season. Having come through the Swansea game unscathed, he is likely to stay in the team when his old club Wolverhampton Wanderers travel to Teesside.

The 25-year-old, also capable of switching inside, was on the Wolves books between September 2008, after signing from Exeter, and June 2010, before he left to join Doncaster Rovers.

He never made many appearances for the Molineux club, but did play at Old Trafford when Mick McCarthy got in to trouble for making too many changes against Manchester United in December 2009 when Wolves lost 3-0.

Friend has come up against Wolves in the past, but is looking ahead to seeing a few old faces this afternoon when his former club are looking to close a five-point gap to the play-off places.

"I have faced Wolves before but it will be nice to do it again," he said. "I know quite a few of the Wolves lads from my time there, so when they come up it would be nice to beat them.

"Wolves' performances have not been fantastic. They have been under achieving this season, but they still have some good players and have won their last two games."

Preparations for the visit of Wolves have not been straight-forward. As well as the freezing conditions at Rockliffe Park this week, the 700-mile round trip to Swansea prevented any training ground work yesterday on the team's shape.

"We can't think about them too much and have been trying to prepare right," said Friend. "There's obviously a shorter gap because of the Wednesday game but we are not too bothered about that.

"It was disappointing not to reach the semi-final of the cup, but we have to look at the league again and make sure we go up. We were relishing the challenge of coming up against the likes of Sunderland and Swansea. It wasn't to be though. It's s shame the cup run has come to an end but we have to concentrate on the league."