PAUL Clement has told Andrija Novakovich the door remains open at Reading FC.

The 22-year-old striker was handed a new two-year deal in the summer after banging in 19 goals in 35 games on loan at Telstar in the Dutch second division last season.

The 6ft 4ins forward immediately joined Dutch top-flight side Fortuna Sittard for the season and has picked up where he left off with four goals in eight league games.

His form has not gone unnoticed by the USA national team and he trained with Dave Sarachan’s squad before their 1-1 friendly draw with Peru on Wednesday.

Novakovich has three international caps to his name having scored six goals in 17 games for USA’s youth teams.

But few people at Reading have spoken to Novakovich in the past 18 months let alone seen him play.

However, Clement insists he remains a Royal and is in their thoughts.

“He’s a Reading player,” he said. “When your players go out on loan you want them to do well, whether it’s Tennai Watson at Wimbledon or Sam Smith at Oxford.

“You want to see them playing, scoring and being effective and that’s what it’s all about.

“I’m really pleased Andrija and the others are gaining experience because it can only help Reading.”

Novakovich has been a Reading player since 2014 when he joined the club’s youth ranks.

He made his first-team debut against Watford the following year but played only one more game before a loan to Cheltenham followed.

Now his exploits in the Netherlands have led to calls from Reading fans to bring him back to the UK and help a team which has struggled for goals all season.

Clement added: “I’ll have to check the re-call option and see if there’s a possibility to bring him back or leave him there, we’ll have that discussion.

“I haven’t spoken to him and I don’t think many people have seen him.

“I hadn’t seen Yakou Meite until he joined us for pre-season and I saw things I liked, he contributed a lot and he signed a new long-term deal recently.

“Hopefully that can happen with Andrija as well.”

Clement’s concerns up front show no sign of ending with injury likely to rule top scorer Jon Dadi Bodvarsson and Sam Baldock out of Saturday’s home clash against Millwall (3pm ko).