Express & Star

Injury comeback for Albion's Matej Vydra

Matej Vydra made a goalscoring comeback from injury as Albion's Under-21s clinched a thrilling 4-3 win over Reading.

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The Udinese loanee has been out with a hamstring injury, but scored the Baggies' first goal as they recovered after going 2-0 down inside the first eight minutes.

George Thorne played the whole game yesterday as he continued his recovery from nine months out with a cruciate knee ligament injury. Alex Jones' late penalty won it.

Vydra and Kemar Roofe cancelled out early strikes from Jake Taylor and Gozie Ugwu before Taylor put Reading 3-2 ahead after 27 minutes. But Joe Ward levelled with 10 minutes remaining before Jones scored from the spot in the 88th minute.

"We started off very badly and we defended poorly," said senior professional development coach David Oldfield.

"We were two goals down inside eight minutes and we had to show a great deal of character to fight back.

"It's a great result and the boys showed great courage to get back into the game.

"Matej played for an hour and came through the game quite well. George played another 90 minutes and played well. He showed the maturity we expect from him and that helped the other guys."

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