Portsmouth sweat on yet another injury lay-off after midfielder is latest casualty in Millwall defeat
Pompey are sweating on Tom Lowery after the midfielder suffered yet another injury blow.
The former Crewe man was forced off in the 66th minute of the Blues’ 1-0 defeat to Millwall in the Carabao Cup after feeling his hamstring.
It represented his first outing of the season, having been an unused substitute for Saturday’s excellent point at Elland Road.
Lowery’s two years at Fratton Park have been blighted by injury problems, with the extent of his latest set-back to become clearer over the next 24 hours, according to John Mousinho.
Pompey are already without Josh Murphy (ankle), Tom McIntyre (hamstring), Jacob Farrell (knee), Regan Poole (knee), Yengi (groin) and Colby Bishop.
It remains to be seen whether Lowery has now joined the six in the treatment room.
Mousinho told The News: ‘Tom’s okay, he felt his hamstring, hopefully it’s just a tightness. We will see how that settles down in the next 24 hours.
‘You’re always concerned when a player goes off and feels a muscle injury, especially when it’s Tom, because we all want Tom to do well and he’s had that injury record
‘We will see how that one settles down.’
Millwall’s Romain Esse’s 13th-minute goal separated the sides in a match of few goal-scoring opportunities.
That decisive moment was presented to him after George Honeyman had caught makeshift central defender Jordan Williams in possession.
While at the other end, Pompey failed to test keeper Liam Roberts and unable to register a single shot on target.
Mousinho added: ‘I’m disappointed to lose the game, for most part we played okay, we were good in spells, decent enough on the ball in the second half and just lacked a bit of quality in the final third.
‘We didn’t really create enough to put a huge amount of pressure on Millwall’s goal, apart from probably the first 15-20 minutes in the second half when we built up a good head of steam and the atmosphere was really good.
‘We just weren’t quite clinical enough in the final third, we didn’t get good enough quality of passes into the box or crosses into the box - and, when we did have our chances, we didn’t put them into the back of the net.
‘Millwall did and we were punished for that mistake in the first half. That was the difference between the two teams.’