Melbourne Heart's hopes of opening their Hyundai A-League win account have suffered a blow with Michael Beauchamp ruled out of Saturday's game against North Queensland because of his ankle injury.
Beauchamp suffered the injury against Adelaide a fortnight ago and it ruled him out of both last week's game against Perth and the Socceroos camp in Europe.
Heart coach John Van 't Schip had earlier been hopeful that the World Cup representative might be ready to take on the Fury and named him in an extended squad, but on Friday ruled him out.
"Beauchamp won’t be there," he said. "We had a good replacement player in Brendan Hamill last week. He's only 17 and he did very well at this level."
Van 't Schip said he has every faith in Hamill's ability and thinks the opportunity to play alongside captain Simon Colosimo will be greatly beneficial to his development.
"With the help of Simon next to him. An experienced player and a young player together I think it’s a very good combination to get young players into the team. That's what we saw last week. Hopefully he can make the next step," the coach said.
Of the starting XI who took on Perth last week, only Nick Kalmar, who scored a cracking second goal in that match, is in doubt this week after missing training in the lead-up.
"He's a player coming from the VPL still getting used to a higher level. He didn’t train the whole week. We will have to see how we approach that," he said.
"I'll bring another player in if he doesn’t start. But I'm not going to say that as it might help the opposition."
Michael Marrone and Gerald Sibon have both overcome illness and will be fine to play after struggling through last week's game, while Van 't Schip said Alex Terra's fitness is improving every week.
The Brazilian also feels he is getting stronger and he is not far from reaching his peak.
"I'm feeling good and I feel like I'm adjusting to things well. It's taken a bit of time but I feel ready now to show my best over an entire game," he said through an interpreter.
Van 't Schip has been impressed with what Franz Straka has achieved with Fury so far this season and sees this match as a difficult one.
"They had a very good start of course. Good results against Perth, Sydney and Melbourne. They are a very young challenging team, with a lot of fighting spirit. They have got a lot of players on their second chance and I think that enthusiasm is very important for their team," he said.
"They have good endurance, they can keep on going. Hopefully we can get them on the right moment after they lost to Adelaide last week. "