After mixing with royalty last week when the Queen presented me with my MBE, I was treated like royalty at the weekend after being asked to be an expert summariser for the Manchester derby.

Sky Sports invited me up from Reading to give my perspective on the Manchester United against Manchester City clash at Old Trafford and I was only too happy to accept.

They flew me to Manchester and had a chauffeur pick me up at the airport along with Richard Keys, Sky's top presenter.

Before I went up to the commentary booth I had to go pitchside to do an interview that was being beamed to China. I spoke about the game, the importance of it and who I thought was going to win and so forth. You won't be surprised to hear I did not do it in Chinese - Sun Jihai, my former team-mate at City, did not teach me enough to be able to do that!

From there I went up to the box to prepare.

I have been a guest on Sky before, when City played Arsenal, and they must have thought I did well enough to invite me back. But while I knew what to expect you have to remember that you are talking to an audience of millions of people.

The make-up people made sure I looked my best, powdering my face and tightening up my tie, which I had thought I had done up OK.

I was joined in the booth by Mark Hughes, the former United striker who is now the boss of the Welsh national team.

When I left Bermuda and joined Manchester United as a trainee Hughes was the main player. He had come back from Barcelona and was one of the big signings at the club and so it was nice to see him again.

It all went nicely, in part due to the fact I had done it before. We spoke for about half-an-hour before the game about various aspects, watched the first half and then gave our opinions at the interval.

At this point City were 2-0 down, Ruud van Nistelrooy and Paul Scholes having both scored, so my comments were based on the fact that I thought City were trying to beat United by playing them at their own game. I said I couldn't recall too many teams going to Old Trafford and succeeding by doing that.

When City didn't have the ball they didn't seem prepared to make United work for their opportunities. They seemed to give them too much space and it wasn't until the last 15 minutes of the first half when you could say ‘Yes, that's a tackle that you would expect to see in a derby'. Before that they just looked like two Premiership teams as opposed to two fierce rivals.

In the second half they did get a bit more into United's face, were a bit more aggressive and tried to win a few more balls and they got their reward in the form of a goal from Shaun Wright-Phillips. However, they didn't build on that and United began to dominate and were able to get a third, Scholes getting his second. With that it was game over.

Although I had played for both sides I am City - there's no doubt about that - and so I was disappointed with the result. I have mates there and I still have a close connection to the club because of the good years I had there.

On the injury front, everything seems to be going well.

As you know I had an operation on my knee which has prevented me from taking part in Reading's recent matches.

Since the procedure I have had three sessions of running combined with weights. Yesterday was the first time I had lifted anything close to what I had done before the injury and in terms of strength I am getting back to where I was.

It's now a case of continuing with the weights and building up my fitness. The physio hopes that in around ten days time I will be able to join in with training. Between now and then I think I will do a good week of running on my own, two or three days of ball work, also on my own, and then join in with the rest of the lads.

After one or two training sessions, and presuming everything is OK, I would expect to be thrown into a reserve game and then it's just a question of when the gaffer believes me to be match fit and ready for first team action.

What I don't want to do is come back too early and have a breakdown, but I feel as though I can do a little bit more than I am now. I think they are just holding me back a bit so I can get my fitness up and have an extra three or four days of recovery so that I am all the better for it when I do start to kick the ball, tackle and so forth.

Ideally, I think the gaffer would like to have me available as soon as possible, especially as we have a relatively small squad.

After the 3-0 defeat at Stoke on Saturday I am sure that is the case. Certainly, that's what I'd like to think.

The last thing you want is for them to say ‘we're not really missing you, take your time'. So fingers crossed I'll be back sooner rather than later.