Portsmouth boss’ concern over Whatmough injury

The 22-year-old was substituted in the 28th minute of this afternoon’s clash, following issues with his knee.

Moments later the Blues fell behind, with replacement Christian Burgess’ mistake contributing to Mallik Wilks’ opener.

Whatmough has twice suffered serious injury to the same knee, battling back to re-establish himself in Pompey’s side.

Last month he signed a new two-year Fratton deal, reward for an outstanding season alongside Matt Clarke in the heart of the defence.

Now the Blues’ medical staff will assess the latest injury set-back for the popular Gosport youngster.

Jackett said: ‘Jack felt his knee again, which is not good news.

‘Hopefully it’s not too bad, but was bad enough to want to come off straight away.

‘It’s the knee that he’s had problems with previously, there were several twinges, and hopefully it settles down and is nothing more than a scare. We’ll see.

‘Jack put his hand up to come off, you could see it happen a couple of times. He carried on and made one clearance into the stand but, to be fair, as soon as the ball went out the first time he should have gone down.

‘He played on for another minute or so and then it took us a bit to get the substitute on.

‘I knew he wanted to be substituted straight away, you could tell from his reaction. He has enough experience to know when he needs to come off.

‘We will see what the diagnosis holds, it has been a bit of trouble for him in the past and hopefully there are no troubles ahead and he has a great run.’