Essendon captain Matthew Lloyd will miss at least a week with a bruised heel as the Bombers deal with the fallout from a stinging five-point loss to Richmond at the MCG on Sunday.
Lloyd hurt himself after landing awkwardly for a mark and was forced from the field late in the third term. It completed a dirty day for the struggling champion who was held goal-less and could miss several weeks as his team fights to remain in finals' contention.
Bombers' coach Matthew Knights said Lloyd would miss next Sunday's clash against West Coast at Subiaco adding he was no certainty to resume against the Brisbane Lions a week later.
"We can certainly see some rawness, it bled quite heavily initially,'' Knights said.
"I would have thought he would be in grave doubt for next week. I wouldn't like to predict any further than that.''
The shattering loss leaves the Bombers in a major battle with Port Adelaide and Hawthorn for eighth spot and means they must win at least four of their final five matches to feature in September action.
"We let a big a opportunity slip. That's a fact,'' Knights said.
"It was a terrible disappointment today to drop an opportunity, to drop a game like that. At different stages of the game we gave ourselves an opportunity to win the game.''
"When you look at it statistically, when you have had 80 more disposals, and 12 more inside 50s, in excess of 20 more marks, it's very, very frustrating, disappointing."
"But we copped our right whack today. Our skills weren't good enough.''
On a day when momentum regularly swung, the Bombers led by a goal 20 minutes into the third term but were forced to play catch-up in the final quarter after the Tigers had kicked out to a 22-point advantage.
Knights lamented his team's poor disposal, with midfield hardnut Jobe Watson (22 possessions) and Mark McVeigh (12) struggling to have an impact.
"We didn't respect them (Richmond) enough as we should. That's why we are a middle-of-the-road side,'' he said.
"We can't push much further than that or past that at the moment because we have patches in games where we play some excellent footy and then we play some really poor, average football in games.''
"The most disappointing part about it all was, we actually didn't play our brand of football until the game was gone when we had to generate energy, run and enthusiasm from the back."
The Bombers have major concerns up forward now Lloyd is out. Fellow veteran Scott Lucas kicked two goals but is a fading force and almost certainly will retire at the end of the season.
Knights said youngsters Jay Neagle and Darcy Daniher were likely to return next week to be attacking marking targets in a team which has now dropped three of its past four games.
"You would obviously like a couple of younger forwards to go with Lloyd and Lucas but I think it (the problem) was more so up the field,'' Knights said.
"We didn't generate enough run through the back and midfield in that first half.''