Coventry boss Mark Robins said winger Tatsuhiro Sakamoto suffered a “terrible injury” during his side’s 3-0 home defeat to Preston.
The 27-year-old landed heavily following a challenge by Andrew Hughes in the first half and was taken off the pitch on a stretcher.
Robins said: “Tatsu’s got a terrible, terrible injury.
“I’m praying and hoping he’s OK because that doesn’t look good at all. They can’t be clear, they’re talking about a pelvic and spinal injury, so I’m just hoping he’s OK.”
The Coventry boss admitted his team were “bullied” from the first whistle to the last as they lost at home for just the second time this season.
Emil Riis thumped a header home in the first minute and was involved heavily in Will Keane’s 12th of the season before Bobby Thomas put through his own net after 38 minutes.
Robins said: “We got bullied. From minute one to minute 98 we got bullied. That’s what I put it down to.
“There’s physical games and then there’s tonight. That was more like when I played, that was like what we used to play in and we just didn’t cope with it.
“We’ve had physical performances before and we’ve been fine, but for whatever reason we just looked disjointed, we looked like a team of individuals and that’s as far away from a performance of any of my teams as it’s ever been, it was poor.
“I take responsibility for everything, the performances have got to be better than that and that was far away from a good performance, but sometimes football kicks you in the teeth.
“We have to get back as quick as we can. The good thing for us is we’ve got a game on Monday (against Maidstone in the FA Cup). There’s a big, big challenge there on Monday against a side that’s going to want to come and do the same thing and put us on the back foot, but we’ve allowed that to happen.”
Preston manager Ryan Lyon hailed a “top performance” from his team.
“Front foot from minute one, set-play goal that we worked on, I couldn’t have asked for any more really,” he said.
“Coventry are a good team, they had a go to be fair, I just thought we were better all round. I thought the lads were fantastic.
“I’m over the moon for the boys, but it’s just another win, it takes us closer to the points tally that we set yesterday, what we did last time.
“We’ve always played different types of football, I think sometimes you have to pay the opposition respect. Coventry are an attacking force who score goals at home, but they couldn’t get near what they want tonight.
“Whatever brand it is, it’s just about winning football matches. The belief has just shot through the roof because of the results they’ve been getting and long may that continue.
“We’ve got 10 or 11 weeks to give it our best shot, the lads have set another target and we’ll just go for that target. I don’t want to get too carried away.
“If we can keep doing the right things, there’s teams that will want to shoot you down, but we’re coming up against teams around us and let’s just give it our best shot.”
Indonesia 0-4 Japan: Visitors stay unbeaten with rout
Japan continued their unbeaten start to World Cup qualifying with a 4-0 victory over Indonesia on Friday.
Two goals from the visitors in either half were enough to seal the three points and get them back to winning ways after a stalemate with Australia last time out.
Ragnar Oratmangoen should have put Indonesia ahead, but he hesitated one-on-one with the goalkeeper, and Japan did not look back after that. They got a bit of fortune with their first goal, Justin Hubner deflecting a cross into his own net in the 35th minute.
Takumi Minamino got their second just before the break, finishing off a pacy counter-attack by darting onto the end of Kaoru Mitoma’s cross to sweep it past Maarten Paes.
While there was not much the goalkeeper could do with that one, he was at fault for the third as he gifted the ball to Hidemasa Morita, who coolly picked out the bottom corner just after the break.
Yukinari Sugawara came off the bench to round off the scoring in the 69th minute. He raced down the right wing and instead of looking to his options, he rifled it in from a tight angle at the near post.
Japan are up to 13 points after five games, sitting top of Group C, while Indonesia are bottom, still in search of their first win.
Data Debrief: Clinically done
For a team still chasing their first win, Japan are probably not high on the list of opponents they would want to face, and Indonesia were undone by their visitors.
Hajime Moriyasu's side created 0.79 expected goals (xG) to Indonesia's 0.72, while they only had four more shots than their hosts (12 compared to eight).
Japan took their chances, and though the win margin may look harsh, they were deserving of the three points, having dominated throughout the game.
Jamaica 0-1 United States: Pepi give visitors advantage in Nations League quarter-final
Ricardo Pepi's first-half strike gave the United States a 1-0 advantage over Jamaica after the first leg of their Concacaf Nations League quarter-final.
The hosts saw a penalty saved in the first half before their frustrations were compounded late on thanks to Mason Holgate's red card.
The USA had the lead just five minutes in – having smothered a Jamaica attack at one end, the visitors caught them out with a pacy counter-attack, with Pepi sweeping it into the back of the net.
Shortly after, Shamar Nicholson was brought down by Matt Turner when he tried to take it around him, but the goalkeeper made amends, diving low to his right to deny Demarai Gray from 12 yards.
In the second half, Holgate was denied a tap-in by Yunus Musah before Turner scrambled to stop Leon Bailey's corner from nestling into the net as Jamaica searched for an equaliser.
With 86 minutes on the clock, Holgate received a second yellow card in just over 10 minutes for dragging Brandon Vazquez back, meaning he will miss the return leg in Missouri on Monday.
Data Debrief: Hitting the mark
Pepi got the all-important goal on Thursday, and is the fourth player to score 12 goals for the USA before turning 22 years old, joining Landon Donovan, Jozy Altidore and Christian Pulisic.
But it was perhaps Turner who actually had the most vital interventions; he has now saved three of the eight penalties he's faced for the USA, including two against Jamaica.
Mauricio Pochettino also could not have asked for a better result from his first competitive game in charge of the Stars and Stripes as he became just the third full-time manager to win his first competitive away match, joining Bob Bradley (2008) and Steve Sampson (1996).
Real Madrid hit Twente for seven, five-star Wolfsburg also win big
Real Madrid had six different goalscorers as they trounced Twente 7-0 in the Women's Champions League on Wednesday, while Wolfsburg beat Galatasaray 5-0.
Signe Bruun opened the scoring three minutes into the Group B encounter at the Estadio Alfredo Di Stefano, then Maria Mendez's header gave Madrid a 2-0 half-time lead.
Madrid, who had won one and lost one of their opening two games in the tournament, got a third through Naomie Feller five minutes into the second half, then Caroline Weir made it 4-0 with a brilliant free-kick.
Mendez headed home her second of the encounter shortly after the hour mark, while Oihane Hernandez and Carla Camacho got on the scoresheet late on to complete the rout.
The victory took Madrid second in the Group B standings ahead of Chelsea's trip to Celtic.
Wolfsburg were also convincing victors in Group A, getting off the mark for this season's competition as Rebecka Blomqvist scored a hat-trick in their 5-0 thrashing of Galatasaray.
The Bundesliga side – who failed to pick up a point or score a goal in their opening two matches – had a narrow 1-0 lead at half-time through Joelle Wedemeyer, before Blomqvist took centre-stage in the second period.
She tapped home after Janina Minge struck the crossbar, then added her second goal in the 77th minute and her third six minutes into stoppage time.
Vivien Endemann powered home a fifth for Wolfsburg one minute later, as they provisionally moved within three points of Lyon and Roma ahead of their meeting.
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