Albion are sweating on star man Anthony Knockaert after he was crocked ten minutes into their first pre-season friendly.

The French winger hurt an ankle in a tackle in last night's 2-0 win against Fortuna Dusseldorf in Austria.

Knockaert signalled to the bench that he needed to be replaced and limped off after treatment.

He left the ground on crutches, with the ankle encased in a protective boot.

Albion's opening Premier League fixture against Manchester City at the Amex is four weeks away.

Boss Chris Hughton told The Argus: "It is a concern. Anthony generally rides these challenges and when he came off it's not like him. We'll wait and see, there's no point thinking the worst.

"We'll see how it is over the next couple of days and hopefully it won't be so bad."

Hughton was unhappy about some of the tackles by Fortuna players in a fiery game, which he branded as too physical for Albion's opening run-out as they won with late goals by Jamie Murphy and Tomer Hemed (pictured below).

"Probably yes for us if I'm being honest," he said. "For a first game there were some tackles flying in that could have been deemed as reckless challenges but these are the things that you have to be able to cope with.

"You certainly don't want anything that's over the top but it's a manly game. There were probably worse challenges in the game than the one on Anthony. The lad has obviously caught him."