ASTOUNDING as it sounds, Collingwood says Josh Fraser, whose season appeared in jeopardy on Saturday night, is an outside chance to play when the Magpies meet St Kilda on Friday night.

The rumours of a premature season end for the Magpies' No. 1 ruckman are groundless, according to the club.

Fraser, who was checked yesterday morning after playing for Victoria, could have a grade-one tear to his posterior cruciate ligament, probably received in a knee-on-knee clash with an opposition ruckman in the final term of Saturday night's representative game.

There were reports out of the match that Fraser had torn his posterior cruciate ligament and could miss as many as 10 weeks, but swelling around the area was minimal yesterday,

The Pies' football manager Geoff Walsh said that both Fraser and a Collingwood doctor with Victoria's medical team had indicated he could line up this week, although he is more likely to miss one week and return against Geelong in round nine.

"He'll have a scan tomorrow but the scan will only confirm what our doc thinks — it's a mild strain, or a low grade strain, so it's not too bad," Walsh said yesterday.

"(Dr Andrew Jowett) looked after him last night and has assessed him again this morning and it's probably a grade-one posterior cruciate ligament strain, which is not too bad.

"The way Josh feels himself last night and again this morning, he was hopeful he could play this week … Josh is saying that, and our doc said 'if Josh is feeling like that, well, then that's a good sign.' Our doc will reserve his judgement until he sees him again tomorrow and sees how it settles down Tuesday."

Sydney's Adam Goodes famously played an entire season with a posterior cruciate ligament injury in 2004.

Walsh said yesterday that he knew as early as Saturday night that the damage to Fraser's knee wasn't anywhere near as bad as had been reported.

"I don't know where that came from. It certainly didn't come from us," he said.

"He (Jowett) was the doctor last night so I knew fairly soon after it happened that it wasn't too bad according to the doc, so I don't know who got the report that he was going to be out for 10 weeks."

An experienced football administrator, he said he had no misgivings about the exercise of playing representative footy mid-season, even in light of Fraser's injury.

There was also promising news for suspended Eagle Daniel Kerr yesterday.

A member of the Dream Team on Saturday night, Kerr was sent to hospital for X-rays immediately after receiving a knock to his lower leg in the opening term.

There were concerns he might have cracked a fibula bone.

But he was cleared of a fracture and diagnosed with severe bruising, and with two games still to serve on his three-match suspension for head-butting, the midfielder is expected to resume playing in round 10.

It's understood that Brisbane Lions' Jonathan Brown, who was desperate to lead Victoria despite being kept out of his club's round-seven clash with Geelong because of a quadriceps injury, pulled up fine from Saturday night's game.