PLYMOUTH Albion's highly-rated prop Martin Rice is facing another lengthy spell on the sidelines after suffering knee ligament damage in Saturday's 37-9 National Division One defeat at Bedford Blues.

Rice has recovered from two potentially career-threatening injuries in the past 18 months, having torn both his posterior cruciate and medial collateral ligaments and suffered a prolapsed disc in his neck.

But his bad luck continued on Saturday when he was forced to leave the Goldington Road pitch just six minutes into the second half.

Rice, who has been in top form in the last few weeks, has damaged his medial collaterial ligaments (MCL) in the opposite knee to the one he injured last season.

The club, who have already had fellow prop James Tideswell ruled out for the rest of the season after rupturing anterior cruciate ligament (ACL), should find out in the next few days how bad Rice's injury is and whether he will need an operation.

To add to Albion's injury woes – they entered the Bedford clash without 10 players – fly-half Kieran Hallett was also forced to leave the pitch at half-time on Saturday with a facial injury.

"Kieran is upset that he has got a bad injury, one obviously bad enough to pull him off the pitch," said chairman of rugby Graham Dawe.

"Martin has damaged his MCL but we are waiting for a scan to see how bad it is.

"It is on the other knee to the one he injured before, but it is a bitter blow for us to have two more players picking up injuries.

"You don't want to lose two good players – or indeed any two players – in one match.

"We just don't know if it is going to be for a long time or not."

Rice's and Hallett's injuries were just about the icing on the cake for Albion as they suffered their first league defeat in five matches.

The visitors trailed 8-6 at half-time after Bedford scored the game's opening try in the fourth minute of first half added-on time, courtesy of Will Harries, with Hallett lying injured on the floor.

But Plymouth went 9-8 in front on 45 minutes thanks to replacement Ross Laidlaw's penalty.

At that stage, despite playing far from their best, Albion were in good shape to get something positive from the game.

However, six minutes after losing Rice, captain Arthur Brenton was yellow carded on 52 minutes against his former club and while he was off the field, Bedford racked up 24 points through four tries and two conversions to end the game as a contest.

"I think we had played the way we wanted to play," said Dawe, referring to the point where his side took their 9-8 lead.

"We could have kicked the ball a bit better, perhaps, in the first half and we gifted them too many opportunities to run back at us, but having said that, it is not easy to play out there.

"The try before half-time hurt us because we had soaked up everything they had to throw in the first half and didn't really have a problem with it.

"But then they found a way of getting through us and they got the five points."

Dawe's comment on Brenton's yellow card and his side conceding 24 points while down to 14 men was: "You just have to be careful when you go down to 14 – you have got to run that clock.

"You are not playing at home against a third division team – you are playing away at a first division club and you need that clock to keep ticking without conceding any points.

"The final score was not a fair reflection of the percentage of play or territory, perhaps, but Bedford took their chances well."