Collingwood coach Craig McRae was adamant Norm Smith medallist Bobby Hill can be positive to take his place in Monday’s King’s Birthday conflict with Melbourne after he needed to be helped from the sector on Thursday when he rolled his ankle throughout coaching.
The harm checklist on the Magpies is already a prolonged one, with 13 names together with the likes of Jordan de Goey, Scott Pendlebury and goalkickers Jamie Elliott and Brody Mihocek.
However McRae was assured Hill, who suffered the scare in the direction of the tip of coaching, wouldn’t be added to the checklist, with no scans required at this stage.
“He’s positive, he simply tweaked his ankle somewhat bit,” he mentioned.
“We’ve bought 4 days earlier than our recreation, so there isn’t any concern there.”
McRae additionally moved to quell fears over the long-term way forward for Elliott, who’s receiving ongoing therapy for a vascular subject that former coach Nathan Buckley revealed left him with a “black foot” after one recreation.
The membership’s medical employees this week confirmed Elliott may very well be again earlier than the finals and he returned to the observe on Thursday morning to do some working after being given the inexperienced gentle in a optimistic signal for the 31-year-old who hasn’t performed since spherical 8.
“There was some unknown timeframe round Jamie’s harm and we needed to work by means of that, however we bought some actually excellent news in the course of the week that the therapy he’d been utilizing has been working,” McRae mentioned.
“He’s on the mend and he did his first working session at the moment. We hope he’s six to eight weeks away.”
The Magpies ought to get Will Hoskin-Elliott again for Monday’s conflict and Nathan Kreuger might play his first recreation since spherical 7 final yr after kicking three objectives within the VFL final weekend.
“Kreugs has been enjoying some good footy, we simply want a bit extra time in his legs. He’s missed lots of footy over quite a lot of years now, so we simply wanted to get by means of some video games. He bought by means of a recreation and kicked three objectives,” McRae mentioned.
“The three objectives is one factor however what he did was round that and enjoying ruck and different choices. His title will certainly be into consideration.”
McRae additionally shut down any ideas captain Darcy Moore may very well be moved ahead amid the harm worries after the skipper mentioned “positive” when requested this week concerning the risk.
