Orazio Fantasia will miss the remainder of the Bombers home and away season and potentially the start of the Club’s finals campaign.
The dynamic forward suffered a hamstring strain in the first quarter of the Dons win over Carlton.
Subsequent scans have revealed the strain will keep Fantasia on the sidelines for the next five to six weeks.
“At the time it looked like quite a serious hamstring,” High Performance Manager Justin Crow said.
“The scan results show it’s a grade two plus, which means he’s going to miss five to six weeks.
“He’ll need everything to go right and we’ll start to progress him up as he’s able over the coming week.”
There was better news for Joe Daniher who was cleared of any structural damage to his knee after landing awkwardly during the match against the Blues.
Daniher played out the game and will be fit to take on Adelaide on Saturday night.
“His knee hyperextended and sometimes when that happens you can get some really bad injuries,” Crow said.
“Fortunately for Joe and us he got away with it.
“He was a little bit sore in his knee but he was able to play out the game and he’s looking pretty good this week and he’ll train tomorrow.”
Ben McNiece will have a scan on his neck on Wednesday before meeting with a specialist to determine the next step in his recovery.
The Next Generation Academy recruit has been sidelined since mid June.
Mitch Brown is expected to be available for round 23 as he continues his recovery from an ankle injury.
While James Kelly and Andrew McGrath will be up for selection for the game against the Crows after they were rested last week.
“Both of those guys are jumping out of their skin, they really sharpened up over the weekend, they’re looking forward to training tomorrow and we’ll expect them to give us a real burst on the weekend,” Crow said.