Hawthorn midfielder James Worpel will miss up to four weeks with an ankle injury but has avoided the lengthy stint on the sidelines which had been feared.
The Hawks ace hobbled off the SCG in his club's season-opening win against Sydney on Friday night.
When arriving back in to Melbourne Airport on Saturday, Worpel had a moon boot on his right leg and was walking with a crutch.
But the 26-year-old will avoid surgery and could be back in three weeks.
"He's been for scans and the scans are relatively promising," Hawthorn high performance boss Peter Burge said.
"He's got a moderate-grade syndesmosis ankle injury.
"We're thinking it's a three to four-week turnaround. He certainly won't need any surgery.
"It'll be conservative management like we've done before.
"We've had Meeky (Lloyd Meek), (Jack) Scrimshaw and Nick Watson last year with the same injury and we were able to turn them around in a pretty reasonable time.
"We're confident that we'll be able to do the same with this one."
Worpel will sit out matches against Essendon, Carlton, and GWS, but should be in line to return for Hawthorn's Gather Round grudge match against Port Adelaide as the Hawks have the bye in round four.
Forwards Calsher Dear (back) and Mitch Lewis (knee) are still out indefinitely.
Sydney are sweating on scans to injury-plagued veteran Taylor Adams, who suffered a hamstring issue against the Hawks.
