The 20-year-old goalkicker won't face North Melbourne in Bendigo, with the club deciding to take a cautious approach to his most recent injury concern.
"He's got a bit of tightness so that's disappointing because we would have loved for him to play the game," club football operations manager Paul Hamilton said on Thursday.
"It's not a major concern in terms of his injury, but he's got a little bit of tightness in his lower back. We just can't afford to take any risks with him.
"It's something that's been on and off, including last year, so it's a longer-term problem and we just have to be careful with him to make sure he's right to go."
The Bombers remain optimistic their highly-touted forward, who has endured a terrible run with injuries since being drafted in 2006, will be fit to face Port Adelaide in round one on March 29.
"It's one of those things where we will wait and see. The doctors are telling us it's not a serious problem but it would be a high risk to play him this week," Hamilton said.
The Bombers will use Friday night's game as a full dress rehearsal for round one, even implementing a traditional bench of four players instead of the extended squad currently allowed in pre-season matches.
"It's so the players can get a real good run and a real feel for what round one is going to be like," Hamilton said.
"We're excited by that. It means players should become match hardened for round one.
"It's important to be reasonably close [to round one conditions] because there are up to four spots up for grabs so there will be players getting first chance at that.
"There could also be one or two that might come back from injury for round one, but we'd like to start narrowing it down and just start making sure players are playing well together, they're playing good game time and they're getting a feel for each other."
Four players that were rested from last Friday night's semi-final loss to Collingwood will be recalled for the final competitive hit-out of the summer series.
"Dustin Fletcher will come back into the side, as will Jay Neagle and Andrew Lovett, and Jobe Watson is another one," Hamilton said.
"We're going to go with 22 players, and that means there's probably going to be seven, eight or nine players miss out that played last week.
"That's good because it means there will be a bit of competitiveness for round one, so it's up to the guys that get into the side tomorrow night to play well, and the guys that don't, hopefully they can put their best foot forward in the VFL."
Hamilton said Scott Lucas will increase his game time while Matthew Lloyd will play his fourth pre-season match despite initially aiming to run out for just three.
"Matthew is one of these players that loves to play games and he feels the best way for him to get fitness is for him to be playing the game," he said.
"He's been offered the opportunity to take games off but he just doesn't want to do that. He wants to play and he thinks that's the best way to get match fit."
Dream Team watch – Scott Gumbleton is rated an $86,600 forward in Toyota AFL Dream Team 2009.
