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Fears for Walsall's Florent Cuvelier after latest injury

Walsall hope to learn the extent of Florent Cuvelier’s knee injury in the next 48 hours after the midfielder broke down in the defeat to Northampton.

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The 25-year-old was carried off the field in some pain on Saturday as the Cobblers ran out 2-1 winners at Sixfields.

Cuvelier has seen his career blighted by injury over the past few years with the Belgian suffering a career-threatening knee injury while playing for Port Vale in 2014.

But a number of other problems have restricted his game time at the Banks’s Stadium with the ex-Stoke man having only just recovered from issues with his calf and hamstring that kept him side-lined for two months.

Cuvelier picked up his latest injury in the first half at Sixfields following a late challenge from Northampton’s Matt Crooks.

Crooks was then on the receiving end of reckless tackle from Amadou Bakayoko which resulted in the Walsall man being given a straight red card in stoppage time. And boss Jon Whitney felt there was little difference between the two challenges.

“I thought the challenge on Flo was a really bad tackle,” he said.

“I thought the referee should have booked the lad at least. The referee got the big decision right with Ama at the end. But I felt he should have set his stall out early with that one, that was a reckless tackle.

"It was as bad as Ama’s. But early in games you don’t seem to get those decisions.

“I feel for Flo, a lot has been said and after the Northampton game my thoughts were with Flo Cuvelier.

“It’s something in his knee. We are just hoping it’s nothing too sinister but we will see how it is and assess it again on Monday.”

Walsall’s defeat to the Cobbles saw their three match winning run in League One come to an end.

And Whitney admitted his team didn’t hit the heights they showed in the victory over Scunthorpe the week before.

“I thought Ama Bakayoko and Erhun Oztumer had the same energy they showed against Scunthorpe,” he added.

“But other areas weren’t as good. You can’t have a few players playing at four or five out of 10 and expect to go to Northampton and win.

“Against Scunthorpe all the players were seven or eights out of 10. I will look at certain individuals because I think a few of them were way under par.”