North Melbourne coach Brad Scott is "quietly confident" Daniel Wells and Nick Dal Santo will be fit to play Port Adelaide in round three after the star midfielders were injured in the Roos' 82-point mauling of the Brisbane Lions on Sunday.
RELATED: An "emphatic response"
Wells was substituted out of Sunday's game at half-time and spent the rest of the match on the interchange bench with ice on his lower leg, while Dal Santo left the ground at the 12-minute mark of the third term after appearing to strain his left hamstring in a contest.
Dal Santo also played no further part in the game.
Both players have just six days to recover for North's important clash against Port at Etihad Stadium next Saturday night.
Scott told reporters on Sunday it was too early to make "a definitive call" on whether Wells and Dal Santo would be available for the Power clash.
"With 'Wellsy' it was precautionary at half-time because he's tight in that calf/Achilles region and we're a bit gun shy after Andrew Swallow's Achilles (injury) so we made a really conservative call there," Scott said.
"We hope he'll be OK.
"'Dal' had some hamstring tightness throughout the week that he recovered really well from, so we're hopeful that it's just the same thing.
"He had three days to recover from main training (on Thursday) and he's got a week to recover from this, so we'll make those assessments in the ensuing days but we're quietly confident."
PRESS PLAY above to watch the Scott media conference | YouTube
Leadership group member Jamie Macmillan was also a late withdrawal for Sunday's match with lower leg soreness.
Scott said Macmillan's injury was minor but North had decided to err on the side of caution.
"It's strange because he trained through the week and felt OK, but again it was a little bit tight in his lower leg and he's broken his leg before (in round three last year)," Scott said.
"We felt that we wanted to take a no-risk approach with him.
"He's a really important player to us and we want to make sure that we don't put him at risk.
"It also gave Sam Wright an opportunity to make amends after last week which he did today."
