Promising North Melbourne onballer Luke Davies-Uniacke remains without a playing return date but may be only weeks from resuming main training.
The No.4 selection in the 2017 NAB AFL Draft is yet to appear this season, because of a case of 'pubic overload' that saw him stop running in March for an extended period as a preventative measure.
Davies-Uniacke's been back running for the past nine weeks and resumed training last week with fellow rehabilitation group members Kayne Turner (sesamoid/foot) and Nick Larkey (foot).
However, Kangaroos football boss Brady Rawlings said on Friday the 21-year-old was still some way off adding to his 21 senior games.
"It's been around four months now with the pubic overload, so we just need to get him back, and progress him over the next few weeks to get him back to main training," Rawlings said.
"We really need to assess how he pulls up after each training session to see if we can take him to the next level.
"Once he gets back to that main training, he'll need a fair bit of time to get up to the conditioning levels required to play.
"He's a really exciting player for us and we'd love to have him out there on the weekend but for his long-term benefit, we want to make sure he's right when he comes back and we don't have the same issue again."
Rawlings also confirmed Cam Zurhaar was a definite starter against Sydney on Saturday after undergoing a shoulder scan during the week.
He was confident as well that North Melbourne's medicos discovered Larkey's "stress-related" foot injury so early there was no danger of a fracture.
"We got onto it well and truly before that and took the load off him over that COVID period, while we were in stand down, and we've just progressively got him better," Rawlings said.
"He's now running at full intensity and he's doing two to three drills in our main training sessions, so hopefully we can progress him to a full session.
"It might not be next week, it might be the week after, but once we progress him and he's pulling up well from a main training session, then it's probably another week or two of that, then he will be available to play."
Majak Daw (ruptured pectoral muscle) is about a fortnight from returning, while Ed Vickers-Willis (turf toe) and Taylor Garner (hamstring) are still several weeks off being ready.
