Star West Coast midfielder Elliot Yeo will undergo surgery in the coming days after hitting a roadblock in his recovery from a syndesmosis ankle injury.
Yeo injured his right ankle and right knee during a January training mishap that was initially only set to rule him out for the early part of the 2025 campaign.
But with his ankle injury continuing to drag on and no end in sight, Yeo visited a surgeon earlier this week to be told he would require more surgery to fix the problem.
West Coast coach Andrew McQualter is still optimistic Yeo will be able to return for the latter part of this season, but no definitive timeline has been set just yet.
"Yeo is going to have some surgery just to remove some hardware from his ankle," McQualter said after Saturday night's 16.12 (108) to 11.10 (76) loss to Melbourne.
"He'll have a couple of weeks off legs and then build and we're really confident Yeo is going to play a fair chunk of football towards the end of the season.
"He'll have a few weeks to let the wound heal, and then get to work.
"He was obviously having challenges to progress his rehab prior to this.
"So I think at least he's got an answer now of what needs to happen for the next steps."
Yeo is West Coast's best clearance player, and his absence has been heavily felt.
Both Harley Reid and Tim Kelly are struggling for form without Yeo there, and the Eagles sit in last spot with an 0-8 record.
Their clearance numbers against Melbourne were simply alarming, with the Demons winning that stat a whopping 49-26 on the back of Max Gawn's dominance in the ruck.
West Coast are hot favourites to win the wooden spoon, but they'll be hoping to ease the pressure with victory over fellow strugglers Richmond at the MCG next Sunday.
"I've absolutely got an optimism," McQualter said of his future hopes for West Coast.
"I've got no doubt our game's improved in the last three weeks. We just haven't been able to put it all together yet.
"But I think I've been really open about it, we're going to be a work in progress. That's just where we're at.
"But we're in a rush to get better really quickly, and I'm confident our players are heavily invested."
West Coast will be without star defender Jeremy McGovern (concussion) against the Tigers.
It means co-captain Oscar Allen is almost certain to play in defence again for a third-straight game.
"I thought he was pretty good against the Demons. I thought he was really, really good behind the ball," McQualter said of the key forward.
"He saved us on multiple occasions, and had to play a bigger role when Gov went off.
"So without Gov next week, it looks pretty likely that Oscar will stay back."
