Albion match-winner Jerome Thomas believes his crucial double-strike against Reading repaid his team-mates for his red card shame at Arsenal.

The winger marked his comeback from suspension with a vital two goals against the Royals on Saturday, almost a month after his shove on Arsenal’s Jack Wilshere brought his first ever sending-off.

Thomas said: “It was good to be back out there. I felt I owed the team and the staff after getting sent off and hopefully I repaid them.

“It was the first red card of my career so I wasn’t really sure what to do with myself, but it happened. But I always go into every match showing my team-mates and the opposition respect.

“Hopefully we won’t have an issue like that again and now I am back playing I will do what I came here to do, which is hopefully help the team get points on the table.

“I am still learning. It was my first red card and you learn from your mistakes and it’s part and parcel of life. That’s in the past now and I can just crack on and play football.”

Thomas is relishing every game in Baggies colours, after his chance to play in the Premier League with Portsmouth last season was wrecked by a freak back injury.

He said: “I fractured two bones and was out for the whole season. I don’t know how it happened. It was a freak occurrence.

“I went in after training one day and my back was hurting. I was sent for a scan and they told me I had two fractured bones and they didn’t know how to treat it or what to do so I ended up being out for the whole season.

“But it’s healed now and I have been working hard to get my whole body strong to make sure I don’t have any more injuries, so I can stay out there and produce on the pitch.

“I don’t see it as a second chance. People have seen what I can do and it’s easy to get forgotten. Hopefully I am reminding people by scoring goals.

“Middlesbrough was my first 90 minutes in over a year and the performance we put in was great, 5-0 away from home, and I got a goal at the end so I felt strong.

“It was a nightmare to be out after that because you want to continue your run of form, but I have been working hard with the staff and they have been great.

“The training in the last two weeks has been great and we have been working hard and I just took it into the game.

“It was hard being out. I watched the Preston game on Sky and the two home games at the ground and one point from nine isn’t good enough because the play-offs isn’t an option.

“We need a top two spot and that means we need to go into every game trying to win. We have respect for the opposition but I don’t think we should fear any of them and that is my mentality and hopefully it’s the team’s mentality.”