Collingwood’s delicate handling of their most precious on-field asset – Nick Daicos – was reflected in the non-appearance of the precocious superstar at a two-hour plus training session at the club’s headquarters on Wednesday.

Daicos was confined to running indoors, but according to the Magpies, has been able to change directions and move laterally and is progressing steadily in his convalescence from injury, having been running in a straight line at training in recent sessions.

Jordan De Goey (left) and Nick Daicos are working through injury.Credit: Getty Images

That the younger Daicos did not take part in skills drills or in limited versions of match simulation was simply a case of treating his dancing feet – afflicted with plantar fasciitis, which his famed father Peter endured in the late ’80s – with a high degree of care.

Premierships cannot be won in January or February, but they can be lost, as AFL clubs say. Collingwood, it follows, are........

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