Dickson Etuhu was delighted to return to the Fulham starting line-up and pleased to come away from a tough encounter against Odense with three precious points in the Europa League.

The Nigerian midfielder was making his first start Fulham’s 2-0 defeat by Wolves at Molineux in August after coming on as a late substitute against West Brom on Saturday. Etuhu had been sidelined with a thigh injury and hopes to keep his place for Sunday’s Premier League game against QPR.

It had been a while since I was out there. I had been injured for a bit and then found myself out of the starting XI – so it was good to be back.

Of course, it made it even better following a performance and result like that. It was tough at times, but it was good. You just want to show what you can do and hopefully that will be enough.

Etuhu was glad to help the team return to winning ways and wants the momentum to continue for the weekend’s local derby.

It had been a long time coming and it’s given us a real lift. It was good to get our first win of the group stages and we now need to take that into our next game.

That is a difficult match against QPR, but we’ll take a lot from this game. We need to start putting a few wins together now and get some momentum back. Hopefully we can do that on Sunday.

Etuhu heaped praise on Andy Johnson after the striker’s brace settled the game.

That’s what AJ gives you. He has so much quality and he took his goals really well. But that’s what he is all about. When he gets in those positions he can be deadly.

We were under a bit of pressure at times and his goals came at important moments. He gives us something that others can’t and tonight he did that, and in some fashion.

He was lively throughout and was always a threat. Every time we got on the ball he was making his run – he was always an outlet. He had a great game and was rewarded with two goals.