Dynamic half-forward Cory Gregson won't be placed on the long-term injury list in the near future, despite being unlikely to play until the second half of the season.
"It’s not something we’re going to activate at this point of time," the Cats' general manager of football operations, Steve Hocking, told the Geelong Advertiser.
“We can certainly look at doing that, but it’s not something that we’re looking to do currently and it’s certainly not something we’re talking about internally.”
Gregson is still recovering from foot surgery in January and is some weeks away from even returning to the training track.
“He is still not out of the [moon] boot and he’s got a lot of work ahead of him,” Hocking said.
“All going well we expect that he will (play this year) but it’s unknown at this point in time.
“He’s got to finish the period off in the boot and then off the back of that they’ll take him out of that.
"But it’s a very, very slow process from there as far as loading that foot up and getting him back up to speed.
“So he has got a lot of work ahead of him yet before he sees any football at all.”
Gregson. who enjoyed a brilliant debut season in 2015, was first struck down by the foot injury midway through last year.
The 20-year-old South Australian then needed surgery after suffering soreness during the early stages of pre-season training.
“It’s just a slow process," Hocking said. "It’s not a case of any long-term concern, it’s more just about loading it at the appropriate levels and making sure that the foot actually becomes comfortable with that loading and he gets back to running.
“Then you’ve got to catch everything else up, like all of his other muscles and joints, because he’s done no conditioning at all.
“It’s a fair bit of work. You’re talking probably a month to get going as far as the loading goes and then probably another month on top of that as far as getting him back to AFL level training.
“It could be anywhere between six and eight weeks [after he is out of the moon boot], so he is a long way off playing any football.”
