Perth Wildcats co-captain Shawn Redhage trained strongly on Thursday morning in goggles after his eye injury and now will travel to Townsville ahead of Saturday night's with the Crocodiles with coach Rob Beveridge confident his co-captain will be right to play.
Redhage suffered a corneal tear and abrasions to his left eye in last Friday night's 86-62 win at Challenge Stadium over the New Zealand Breakers, but by Christmas Day the blood had gone from the eye.
Now the eye has recovered quickly enough for Redhage to train strongly this morning, while wearing a pair of goggles to protect the eye, and now he will travel to Townsville tomorrow ahead of Saturday night's clash with the Crocodiles.
All 11 Wildcats squad members will make the trip for the clash, though, with the final decision on who plays to be made once in Townsville, but at this stage Beveridge is confident that Redhage will be right to go.
"He got through the training session and felt fine, and looked pretty good out there. It didn’t affect his shooting at all with the goggles on, if anything it was more of a mental thing with the players laughing at him looking like a big bumble bee," Beveridge said.
"The reason he hadn’t trained this week was to keep his blood pressure down so there wasn’t any causal bleeding, but right now it seems fine and he will definitely be travelling to Townsville. It is highly likely that he will be suiting up.
"I won't make a decision about the final group until game day, that's why I am taking the 11. It is highly unlikely, but if for some reason after flying Shawn's eye bleeds again or something like that then I don’t want to have already told a player that he is or isn’t playing. So we will decide on game day."
Wildcats big man Matt Knight is also set to return after missing last Friday's win over New Zealand. He was still feeling some slight after effects from his mild concussion, but Beveridge also has no doubt he will be right to take on the Crocs.
Knight's presence will certainly help as the Wildcats take on Townsville centre Luke Schenscher as well.
"Matty was good. He has had a good couple of days of practice now and I think he will be good to go as well. Hopefully we will have our best team on the court on Saturday," Beveridge said.
"The way I see it as that Luke Nevill on Schenscher is a good match up for us, but when they don’t have Schenscher then Nevill is a very difficult match up for them. It's important for us to exploit their other guys and then also for Schenscher to defend Matt Knight is a very big ask.
"It works well for us as much as it does for them. We mix up line-ups all the time and there's no doubt that Schenscher will play a lot more. He is starting to get his fitness back and he will be very important for them. We will definitely have to match up Nevill on him for sure."
The Wildcats now head to Townsville to take on a Crocs team that has won three of their last four games with point guard Eddie Gill and former Wildcat Peter Crawford in especially hot form.
However, the 'Cats did win in Townsville earlier this season and were the only team to win in The Swamp last season. Given that, Beveridge is looking forward to the challenge on Saturday night.
"We've played exceptionally well up there and in that last game the first half was fantastic, but the second half they came at us hard and we did hold them off," he said.
"They will be feeling very confident and they are talking about how it's payback time and all of that. They can talk it up as much as they like, but we want to go in and play as hard as we can, and try to get the win."
