Star Richmond midfielder Kane Lambert looks likely to miss the last two home-and-away games of the season after undergoing minor ankle surgery earlier today.
Lambert sustained the ankle injury early in last Saturday’s clash with Gold Coast at Metricon Stadium.
“First quarter, he flagged a bit of an issue with his ankle after an incident in the game,” said the Tigers’ Physical Performance Manager Peter Burge.
“He played out the game, but probably wasn’t able to run as well as he normally would. He was a little bit inhibited and came in yesterday limping.
“So we had that scanned and it came out that he’s got a partial syndesmosis sprain in his ankle.
"He went into some minor surgery this morning to put some reinforcement onto the ankle.
“Right now he’s probably going to miss the next two weeks and we’re going to prepare him for the first final.”
Here is Burge’s update on the injury condition of several other members of Richmond’s playing list . . .
Reece Conca, rolled ankle
“Reece was down to play 70 minutes of the (VFL) game, and with four of those minutes to go, he sprained his ankle quite badly. He walked in yesterday feeling not too bad and today he’s even better. So, right now, he’s some chance of being available to play this week, but more than likely will miss just one game . . .”
Toby Nankervis, corked quad
“Toby had a quad cork from the game the week before (v Geelong). He was a little bit sore during the week and we just took the opportunity (to rest him), but he’ll be good to go this week.”
Dan Butler, ankle
“’Buts’ had an ankle syndesmosis sprain, much the same as Kane Lambert. He’d been progressing and building his speed and running about 95 percent, but still with a bit of a limp and still not full power. So last Friday he went in and had the same minor procedure that Kane had this morning, which means he’s going to miss probably the next two games. We’re preparing him for the first final at this stage . . . We’ll get a much better result with this minor surgery. We’ll start him running later this week and build his speed . . .”
Oleg Markov, knee
“Oleg has started running and is looking much better. He just need to build his conditioning base before he returns to play. Probably, best case (for his return), first week of the VFL finals, but more than likely the second week.”
Nathan Drummond, hamstring
“’Drummo’ started jogging today. We’ll progress his conditioning over the next couple of weeks and just see where we end up with that.”
Shai Bolton, knee
“Shai had some knee soreness two weeks ago . . . We gave him some time off and then tried to build him back up again with some running. He was still sore, so he went in last Tuesday for an arthroscope, and had a minor clean-up of his meniscus. He’s back now doing some strength work and will start running, potentially at the end of this week, certainly early next week at the latest. We’re hopeful Shai will be back playing somewhere during the VFL finals . . . on the earlier end of those finals we’re thinking at this stage.”
Noah Balta, corked hamstring
“Different injury, a hamstring cork, but we do see them a lot these days. He was able to get running early last week, but just couldn’t progress to full speed later in the week. So we gave him the week off. He’ll fully train this week. Obviously there’s no VFL game this week, so he probably ends up with another week off. But he’ll fully train with the group . . .”
Mabior Chol, broken foot
“’Marbs’ is conditioning still. We’re building his base and we’re looking to bring him back during the VFL finals.”