JORDAN Obita revealed he was as surprised as anyone to learn of his Reading FC recall on Saturday, writes Anthony Smith.

The 24-year-old left-back faced months on the sidelines after suffering a serious knee injury in a training ground accident in December.

Obita was feared to have torn his medial collateral ligament and was immediately put in a leg brace.

At the time Reading’s caretaker manager Martin Kuhl described the injury as a ‘shock’ and refused to put a timescale on his recovery.

But Obita returned to the first-team fold in place of Andrew Taylor on Saturday as Royals drew 1-1 with Sheffield Wednesday.

Obita admitted: “It was really nice to be back on the pitch and to contribute to the result. I didn’t think I would be back this soon if I’m honest.

“I was back in training for just under a week, trained for a couple of days then played 60 minutes for the Under 21s. Then I got the call from the manager to say I was playing against Sheffield Wednesday, which was great.”

He added: “It was brilliant to get 90 minutes under my belt. After an hour-or-so the manager kept shouting across to ask if I was okay, but I just wanted to get through it and get that first game back out of the way.

“Hopefully, the next game I play won’t be so tough on the body.

“All the gym work you do when you are injured is nothing really, you need to play games to get really up to speed.

“It was good to have some practice with the Under 21s, but first team football is much more physical.”

Royals paid the price for a sluggish start against the Owls and went behind to a Gary Hooper goal.

But Brian McDermott’s men staged a rousing recovery and levelled through Jake Cooper.

“We went behind but I thought we were the better side after that,” argued Obita. “We were attacking them all the time and we showed a lot of quality to get a point.

“At home we want to be on the attack. Sometimes you have got be patient because of the way the opposition are set up.

“After Sheffield scored they just sat back, so we had to choose the right moments to attack and I thought we did really well in that respect.

“We could have scored more goals and on another day we will, but Sheffield know how to get results and that’s why they are in the play-offs.

“Saying that, I thought we were the better team.”

McDermott may rest some first team players this Saturday when Reading host League One Walsall in the FA Cup fourth round (3pm).

But Obita is keen to make up for lost time, stating: “I think things are improving under Brian, though I haven’t been around that much because of my injury.

“But it’s going really well on the training pitch and the plan now is to win against Walsall in the FA Cup.

“I’m up for any game at the moment so hopefully I will play.”

McDermott has received an injury boost for Saturday's cup clash against the Saddlers with Paul McShane, Aaron Tshibola and Stephen Quinn all available for selection.

However, Garath McCleary remains sidelined with a hamstring problem.

New signing Deniss Rakkels could make his Royals debut after joining from Polish side Cracovia for around £400,000 yesterday.

The 23-year-old Latvia international penned a two-and-a-half year deal and was signed by the club's Thai owners rather than McDermott himself.