ST KILDA has ruled out rebounding backman Shane Savage for the rest of the year after suffering a torn hamstring, while injury-prone forward Paddy McCartin's season is almost certainly done as well.
McCartin, 22, suffered a sprain to the Lisfranc ligament in his left foot against Port Adelaide in round 16, and hasn't been seen since.
"It's unlikely (McCartin will return in 2018). He would need to come to hand really quickly," Saints coach Alan Richardson told reporters at RSEA Park on Friday.
"He's still not running. He's got a couple of weeks now where he'll start to put a bit more load through the body and through the legs in particular. We'll just have to see how he responds.
"Then you're talking about a scenario where you're bringing a bloke back for a game. We'll just have to wait and see how he goes."
Savage was hurt about halfway through St Kilda's main session on Thursday.
"He won't play again this year, so it was a reasonable tear," Richardson said.
"He's been a positive for us this year so he's disappointed to miss (against the Western Bulldogs on Saturday night and) he's disappointed to miss the rest of the year."
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Nathan Freeman finally will finally make his debut, 1718 days after he was drafted at No.10 in 2013, while Jimmy Webster, Hunter Clark and David Armitage return to the side.
Armitage's omission from last week's loss to Greater Western Sydney was surprising, given he had averaged 26 disposals since spending a stint in the VFL while dealing with hamstring tendinitis.
"Dave went out of the team because he wasn't quite able to execute the role that we wanted him to do," Richardson said.
"He'd had a pretty good block of games up until that performance (against Richmond) but given (Mav) Weller's gone out, Savage has gone out, the way that we're going to structure the team means that Dave will come back into the team.
"We still think that Dave's still got some really strong footy left in him."
Armitage, 30, is contracted until the end of 2019.
Meanwhile, draftee Ben Paton was named an emergency for the 10th time this season.
The midfielder can play an inside or outside role.
"He's absolutely knocking the door down, Ben. He's got a lot of what we like. He uses the ball really well, he's got good speed, he's really focused on his defence and done a great job at VFL level," Richardson said.
"We're keen to get Ben in pretty soon."
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