ST KILDA'S injury position went from bad to worse, with the confirmation yesterday that luckless defender Matt Maguire would miss the rest of the season after fracturing a bone in his foot.

Nick Riewoldt will miss at least a month's football after straining medial ligaments after being thrown to the ground in a tackle by Tigers defender Luke McGuane. The incident was assessed by the match review panel but no charge was laid.

Xavier Clarke is also out for three weeks after straining his hamstring during the game.

St Kilda coach Ross Lyon had already resigned himself to Maguire's being out for "a number of weeks" on Saturday night, but the news yesterday will have had a devastating impact on Maguire, who was sidelined most of last year with a serious injury in his other foot and broke his leg badly the previous year. Complications from that break at one stage threatened to end his career.

Full-back Max Hudghton was a late withdrawal against the Tigers and is also likely to miss St Kilda's next two games with a hamstring injury.

Tagger Steven Baker is likely to be fit to take on Collingwood after the weekend's break for the Hall of Fame match after jarring his knee.

The Brisbane Lions' Jonathan Brown will make his own decision as to whether he leads Victoria against the Dream Team of players from all other states in Saturday's game.

Brown missed Brisbane's game against Geelong on the weekend with a quadriceps strain. He had no shortage of advice yesterday, with his club coach Leigh Matthews saying pointedly that he hoped the medical officers for the Victorian team displayed the same "duty of care" towards Brown as Brisbane's would, and Kevin Sheedy, the assistant coach of the Victorian team, suggesting that he was "75 to 80%" certain to play.

Sheedy and Neale Daniher, assistant coach of the Dream Team, told a news conference yesterday that they were confident that any withdrawals from the squad would be for genuine injuries only. When the concept of the game was first mooted, it was suggested any player who missed through injury would not be able to play for his club the following round, but Daniher said the AFL had relaxed that stand due to the obvious enthusiasm from players to take part in the match.

Victoria's Luke Hodge and Dream Team squad members Simon Black, Riewoldt and Chad Cornes are the only players out through injury who would otherwise have been in the final squads named yesterday.

Aside from Brown, Victoria's other main injury concern is Gary Ablett, who did not play in the Geelong-Brisbane game either due to a calf injury.

Sheedy said he would "definitely" play this weekend.

"He'll play, don't even worry about it, don't even think about it, just look for him running out there," Sheedy said.

The main bonus for the Dream Team was the declaration by West Coast and All-Australian ruckman Dean Cox that he would play this weekend.

Cox will require a pain-killing injection in his broken foot to play but he is adamant nothing will stop him from taking part in the first representative game of his career.

The Dream Team selectors preferred the Eagle's No. 1 ruckman and Brisbane's Jamie Charman to Fremantle giant Aaron Sandilands and Port's Brendon Lade.

"Cox is All-Australian and we like the way Charman bowls a few of them over," Daniher said.