Wright’s comeback inspired by United defender

Scott Wright admits he was inspired by former Aberdeen team-mate Mark Reynolds’ quick recovery as he battled back from his own anterior cruciate ligament injury.

The Dons winger had been on the verge of making his comeback just as the coronavirus pandemic led to the shutdown in March after picking up the problem in training last September.

Reynolds, who is now at Dundee United, spent only six months on the sidelines after rupturing his ACL in July 2018 and Scotland Under-21 cap Wright was also on track to be back playing in a similar timeframe before the game was forced to take an enforced break.

Wright is relishing the start of the new Premiership season on August 1 following nearly an entire year without competitive football.

And the 22-year-old, who made 13 appearances in a loan spell with Dundee last year, admits he knew he was in the right place for his rehabilitation under the watchful eye of head of medical and sports science Adam Stokes after watching how quickly Reynolds got fit.

Wright said: “It sounds stupid saying it out loud and I’ve even said this to Stokesy, but I was so happy and relieved that I had done it at Aberdeen because I had seen first hand how Mark had done his and how Adam had helped him.

“I thought, I can be gutted tonight and tomorrow we go back to work.

“I knew Mark had done his recovery so quickly and I said to Stokesy: ‘I know that’s an unrealistic goal but I always want to compare myself, I don’t want to be constantly comparing myself to it but I want that in my head’.

“I was absolutely gutted the way things worked out with my knee.

“I know the plan at first was to say that that was my season over but me and Adam both knew strongly ourselves that I had a really good chance of coming back if we both applied ourselves right.”

Wright is back at pre-season training alongside his Dons team-mates and desperate to make up for lost time.

Speaking to Red TV, he added: “I managed to get fit and got two training sessions in.

“The first team had the game on the Friday against Motherwell (on March 13) and I was going to be playing in the under-20 game in ether the Tuesday or the Wednesday because of the international break then I would have been classed as fully returned, fit.

“I have been doing running through the whole time and feel really good.

“I think I’m past raring to go, I’m absolutely buzzing to get started.”

Scott Wright: Will have been out of competitive action for almost a year when the Premiership kicks off on August 1.