COLLINGWOOD is hopeful forward Jamie Elliott has avoided an ACL injury after Scott Pendlebury's record-breaking game was soured when the forward hurt his knee in the dying minutes.

The Magpies had already lost captain Darcy Moore to a hamstring strain at that point and young forward Will Hayes to a dislocated shoulder, with Pendlebury also nursing an issue with his hand in the win over Waalitj Marawar.

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Collingwood coach Craig McRae said the club is optimistic Elliott has avoided the worst-case scenario of a torn ACL, but couldn't rule out the season-ending injury on Saturday night.

"It is too early to make any diagnosis other than we're hopeful. We are hoping for the best," McRae said after the 10-point win.

"We won't know until scans. He's in reasonably good spirits. We can't rule anything out. But we won't know. He clearly is injured, we just don't know what extent yet."

The incident sparked a melee after Collingwood players remonstrated with West Coast key defender Tylar Young, but McRae said he was more worried about Elliott than commenting on that play.

"It's hard to comment on, on the incident. I watched the replay, I was more concerned about Jamie watching his body move than the actual incident," he said.

"Speaking to Jamie afterwards, he goes, 'Oh, why did I go for that mark?' You know, because he normally sort of just bodies and this is his words and maybe the ball hits the ground. He just felt really vulnerable. He is such an incredible athlete. He's saying that he felt in the air. He goes, 'Oh no.' This is how he can see the game at such a slow speed at times."

Moore is set for another stint on the sidelines after failing to finish a third game of four appearances to start 2026.

McRae said the Magpies will assess a range of options, including an overseas trip, given Moore went all the way to Munich in 2018 to deal with soft tissue problems.

"Let's get the scan and see how bad it is and then we'll work through that. We're very progressive. We won't leave a stone unturned. We'll find a way that supports him," he said.

"Clearly, his body's giving him feedback – he needs to get to work on it – and we need to find things that can support that, so we won't rule anything out."

Hayes dislocated his shoulder in the second half and McRae said the club fears he will miss a large block of the second half of the season.

"It looks bad," he said.

"It popped out, but popped in quickly. Scans will reveal all. I'm not a doomsday, but I'd be worried he would miss a fair chunk of the season from here on out."

Eagles coach Andrew McQualter was proud of his team after it pushed the Pies close, getting within three points in the final quarter.

"I'm proud of the way we played. I thought we were really competitive on a big stage," he said.

"We gave ourselves the chance to win, it's disappointing we didn't win because that's what our aim was, to come here today, we thought we could win.

"Unfortunately, we didn't get that done, but I thought we saw growth in our players and our team today. I just said to them after the game, last week we had a pressure game off the charts to be able to win a game of football. We're not going to have that record level type pressure every week so to be able to play well, be competitive without it being exactly where we needed it to be, I think that's a little sign of growth for us.

"I was pleased with the performance, disappointed with the outcome."