Toby Flood was happy to put the dark days of six months on the sidelines behind him after coming off the bench to help Leicester to a 29-20 LV= Cup win over the Newport-Gwent Dragons at Welford Road.
It was a first appearance for the England fly-half since he ruptured an Achilles tendon in the Heineken Cup semi-final against Cardiff in May and he contributed to Leicester's win by kicking two late penalties.
"It was strange having to get my head around the calls again but the fun part was running around again with the guys after such a long time out," Flood said.
"I think the Achilles is all right. I didn't even think about it during the game. I felt confident and, if anything, being involved in a game makes you think about it even less.
"It's been a hugely frustrating period and a bitter-sweet thing. You know you are always going to come back and there is light at the end of the tunnel.
"At the same time there are those dark days and troubled moments where there doesn't seem to be any movement and you are battling on with it for a couple of weeks and it seems pretty stagnant."
Flood's return to action was the main highlight in what Leicester head coach Richard Cockerill described as a disappointing performance by his side.
"I thought we gave ourselves a scare. We executed poorly, gave them three easy tries and I thought it was a disappointing game all round but we will take the win," Cockerill said.
Both Cockerill and Dragons counterpart Paul Turner were critical of the way Hull referee Tim Wigglesworth controlled the game.
"The referee was poor and out of his depth," Cockerill said.
"His scrummage decisions and the way he handled the game were poor all round."
"I wasn't happy with our set piece and Leicester punished us there," added Turner.
"At half-time both Richard and I had a word with the official. It's not my style to want to criticise officials but he didn't sort anything out today particularly and just left everything to chance.
"I felt there were probably about a dozen holding penalties in the first half. We had targeted the breakdown and just didn't get our just desserts there."
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