Sintra: Less than 12 hours after watching from the substitutes’ bench as his teammates secured a third successive Euro 2004 victory, Pavel Nedved returned to training with his usual relish on Thursday.

Jogging, sprinting, turning and diving, he showed no signs of fatigue or the slight knee injury that persuaded the Czech Republic’s coach Karel Brueckner to rest him from the 2-1 victory over Germany.

As he joined in the exercises with nine other senior players in front of a loyal band of Czech supporters, there was no evidence that he was any different to the other 22 men in the squad.

But, according to team doctor Petr Krejci, he is unique, the only man he knows whose kneecap is split into three different parts.

“Most people have a single piece of bone to make their kneecap,” Krejci said on Thursday. “One per cent of people have two parts, but three parts. Only Nedved.”

He said Nedved’s unique knee was known as a patella tri-partitia and it explained why he had a loping, almost shuffling, running style.

“We only really found out about this when he went to Italy and first began to be examined by the Italian doctors,” he explained. “Before that, I don’t think anyone really noticed at all.”

He said Nedved’s knees were both the same and that this explained his running style and his ability to retain control of the ball so adeptly in many tight situations.