THE medics revealed the diagnosis and then left Garry Monk alone to digest the bad news.

Lying on a surgeon's bed with his knee in bits, Swansea City's newly-appointed captain was forced to contemplate the idea that his football career was at an end.

"I am not ashamed to say I had a little tear," Monk says.

Happily, of course, the centre-back remains a professional player.

Even better, he is enjoying probably his best spell since he joined Southampton as a teenager in 1996.

And this weekend — calf injury permitting — he returns to Scunthorpe United determined to banish the memory of his lowest moment as a footballer.

It was August 8, 2006, and Monk was leading Swansea as club skipper for only the second time following the summer release of Roberto Martinez.

But the game was not half an hour old when, after a challenge involving the now Wolves striker Andy Keogh, Monk was stretchered off.

"The main thing I remember is pure pain," he says.

"Their midfielder went to pass the ball into Keogh and he mishit it.

"Because he mishit it, we both turned sharply and all my body weight was on my left leg.

"My studs got caught in the ground and all my weight went through my leg.

"I remember looking at my leg as I went down. I could see it bending and I was thinking 'Oh my God, this is going to hurt'.

"I tried to get back up — and then it was time to get the gas out."

Monk went to hospital in Scunthorpe, but the "trauma" around the knee caused by the injury meant they could do little at that stage.

When he got back to Swansea in the early hours, the pain went up another notch.

"I could not sleep that night because it was aching so much," he continues.

"I went for an MRI scan in Cardiff the next day and that wasn't good. It said the nerve might be trapped on top of all the other damage.

"The aching was getting worse and worse and I was getting worried, so we went straight down to see (knee expert) Jonathan Webb in Bristol.

"As soon as I got in there he lifted up my leg and said 'Right, I need to get you in today'.

"I knew then it was serious.

"He said to me that if the nerve was damaged or there were other complications, there was a chance I would never play football again.

"Two days earlier I had been feeling as fit as a fiddle — I'd had a really good pre-season that year and I was feeling good in the first 20 minutes at Scunthorpe.

"So for someone suddenly to tell you that you might not be able to do something you've done since you were a kid is hard to take.

"I think (then Swansea physio) Richie Evans could see me welling up.

"He and Jonathan Webb made their excuses and left the room and that was when the tears came."

When he left Swansea for Wigan over the summer, Evans rated Monk's successful rehabilitation as the finest achievement of his distinguished stint at the club.

Inevitably, the defender faced a long battle having snapped his cruciate ligament, and he did not play again for more than 12 months.

But Monk did return, and he did so in such style that he was named players' player of the year the following season as Swansea lifted the League One title.

"I have already said a massive thanks to Jonathan Webb, who saved my career," he says.

"Evo was brilliant with me, and so was (assistant physio) Ailsa Jones. They worked with me and pushed me every day.

"I look back now and, in a funny sort of way, it's probably the best thing that's happened to me.

"All summer before the next season started I was training on my own every day and I don't think I have looked back since.

"I have played some of my best football since I came back and the club has moved on as well, so I've loved it."

Monk's fine form has continued in the Championship, where his presence has helped Swansea start life under Paulo Sousa in such miserly mood.

Absent for the last three games with a calf strain, he is hungry to feature this weekend — and to create some happier memories of Glanford Park.

"I thought about this game at the start of the season when the fixtures came out," he reveals.

"The last time we went there is my worst memory in football and it would be nice to play up there and win up there.

"It will be tough because they are strong at home, but we will be full of confidence after the run we've been on."

If he does feature, Monk will be keen to avoid a red card as well as an injury blow.

The 30-year-old was one of three Swans dismissed when Scunthorpe won a stormy Carling Cup tie at the Liberty back in August.

"It wasn't a dirty game really," he remembers.

"I felt their lad was basically cheating, but I shouldn't have got involved.

"None of us should have got involved, and we all know that we can't let that sort of thing happen again.

"I don't think it will be a problem. People on the outside will make something of it, but it's not a grudge match or anything like that.

"The two teams will be worrying about picking up three points and nothing else."