Davey picked up a heel injury in the loss to the Bombers last weekend, but has made good progress during the week and should take his place in the team to take on the Cats.
“Aaron’s been a little bit sore but I think he’s showing all the signs that he’s more likely to play on the night at the moment,” Melbourne coach Dean Bailey said on Thursday.
“Obviously we’ll see how he trains, we’ll give him up until the last minute … if he’s not one hundred per cent we won’t risk him.”
Young Tasmanian Colin Garland will miss out due to a hamstring injury while Brad Miller, who missed last week with a similar injury, is in with a chance of returning.
“He’ll be at training so we’ll see how he goes. He’d probably be 50/50 at the moment,” Bailey said.
As for the return from injury of Geelong’s Gary Ablett this weekend, Bailey laughed off his side’s misfortune in meeting the Cats the week their superstar returns to action.
“That was disappointing that Gary’s back. I thought Bomber might have just kept him out for one more … unless there’s a freak accident down at Geelong that you could organise for me for him not to play, that would be good,” he joked.
“Look he’s a fantastic player. He’s an elite player. I think when the elite players are playing the game … from a challenging point of view, you want the best players playing.
“He’ll be running around tomorrow and he’ll be one headache we’ll have to fix early I think.”
Bailey believes Friday night's match will be a fantastic yardstick by which his players can measure themselves, saying he was optimistic to see the development of the younger brigade of Demons.
“I’m looking forward to tomorrow night probably more than some of the players because that’s when good players take another step … There's going to be a few players on our team who are actually going to take a couple of steps forward in their development.
"They’ve shown that over the last three or four weeks. But against the best team, that’s when you want to bring your best performance.”
