Southampton manager Russell Martin is ‘fearing the worst’ after Jack Stephens picked up an injury in their 2-1 win over QPR.
Stephens hobbled off in the 25th minute after appearing to have injured his left leg.
Speaking to the Daily Echo post-match, he said: “It’s a real negative for us, it looks like a bad one. I think we need to fear the worst on that one, unfortunately. If it’s anything better than the worst I’ll be happy.
“I’m absolutely devastated for Jack if it’s as bad as we think, but we will have to wait and see.”
Russell Martin Che Adams’ absence and performance against QPR
Martin also spoke about the absence of Nathan Tella, who has since departed for Bayer Leverkusen, and more importantly Che Adams, after it was confirmed he was offered a new contract last week.
“The guys who are not in the squad train separately because we have 20 players – they all train every day apart from the day before the game.
“I spoke to Che on the phone on Thursday after we offered him a new contract, and then spoke to him again on Friday in the office.
“We came to an agreement that he wasn’t in the right place to give everything he’s got but both of them played last week and were brilliant despite all the noise.
“It’s been a long week for both of them and the dynamic has changed slightly but I’ve got no problem with either of them.”
Despite Saints’ picking up a 2-1 win, Martin was not overly impressed with his side’s performance.
“We were too slow in the first half and not enough willingness to run. That’s the first time we have played against that shape and we tried to guess. We’ll learn a lot from that.
“The mentality when we score is nowhere near good enough, we need to address that. It’s ridiculous. We were not happy at all at half-time.
“We started the second half not very well but I enjoyed the last half-hour. We are winning while learning and winning while building.
“If you’d have said 10 points from 12 with all the nonsense going on and all the noise then I’m really pleased with that.”