Marshall will almost certainly return in round 18 against Parramatta. That, coincidentally, is the match Lawrence is eyeing off, having progressed well in recent weeks following his hip dislocation in round three.
Lawrence began running earlier this month, and while knowing the club would be cautious with him, acknowledged he was a chance of returning at the same time as Marshall, who damaged his knee on Sunday against Melbourne. ''That's best-case scenario,'' Lawrence told the
Herald yesterday.
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''I'll hopefully have a pretty good hit-out over the bye weekend. If I get through that all right, hopefully I'll be back the week after that. I've been doing a bit of running and I've been bumping it up every week.
''The club don't want to push me too much. It was a pretty unusual injury and there's no real protocol on it. I could be right after the bye but they might just give me the extra week to make sure. I'm just trying to get myself ready.''
A round-18 return would mean Lawrence would have been sidelined for just over three months, which would be quite remarkable given there were fears his season, and even his career, might have been over with his shocking injury.
''It's close to the three months now,'' Lawrence said. ''It probably has been the best-case scenario for me. Everything's gone well with the rehab and I've been working hard. It was pretty tough at the start, not knowing how long I'd be out for, just not knowing any sort of timeframe, but once I had the scans which showed I could play again this year, that there was no damage to the cartilage, it allowed me to keep moving forward. Hopefully I'll get a good four or five weeks in me before the finals to give me time to get some match fitness.''
Lawrence said he was not feeling any pain in his hip.
''I haven't really felt much pain since the third or fourth week,'' he said. ''It's just a matter of making sure it's strong enough now.''
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