CARLTON coach David Teague was reluctant to speculate on the severity of Jack Silvagni's shoulder injury, but said he was "hopeful" it was not serious.
Silvagni came off in the final quarter of the Blues' 11-point win over Gold Coast on Saturday night after laying a game-clinching tackle on Jack Bowes that led to a goal for teammate Harry McKay.
The injury comes just three weeks after Silvagni was taken off in the season-opener against Richmond with a similar problem.
On that occasion, the 23-year-old missed just one match, and Teague is hopeful of something similar this time around.
"In terms of how it is, I actually don't know yet," he said following the match.
"Last time he missed a week … it's probably something like that but I don't know yet.
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"I don't want to say the wrong thing here in terms of my understanding of it, but I know the first week we thought it was going to be worse than it was.
"I'm not sure whether this time there's been greater damage to the inside or not, I'm not sure."
Silvagni's late injury slightly soured a Carlton performance full of merit.
Despite not fully capitalising in the final term, the Blues took control following the last change, turning a one-point lead into a relatively comfortable victory by dominating territory.
"You can very easily get frustrated," Teague said.
"You can dominate the play, or own periods of the play, which we did for short periods at times, and when the score doesn't go on sometimes it has a negative effect, but I thought our guys remained in the moment, they kept competing … I was really impressed with the last quarter."
It was another case of 'what if' for Gold Coast, losing for a third time in four weeks when it was within a goal entering the final 10 minutes.
Coach Stuart Dew was left to lament a spate of mistakes that took away a chance of victory.
"All the technical stuff aside, our turnovers were really disappointing," he said.
"We butchered the ball and gave it back to them far too often.
"We're hurting ourselves continually in pressure moments.
"We need to address that otherwise we're going to continually fall short."
Without a recognised ruckman entering the match, the Suns managed to win the clearance count 47-38, but Dew conceded Carlton's work around the stoppages was far cleaner.
The 1-3 Suns have a date with the unbeaten Western Bulldogs next Saturday and the coach says they have a bit to work on.
"We certainly have to learn to win and that's something we want to address," he said.
"We feel like when we get over that hump we'll be in good shape."
