Fremantle coach Justin Longmuir is confident injured captain Alex Pearce will be available for a round 12 clash with Brisbane at the Gabba in what is shaping as a potential grand final preview.

Longmuir was confident his 30-year-old defender would miss only one week with a low-grade medial ligament injury in his left knee.

The Dockers have a nine-day break leading into their next match against Essendon at the MCG followed by a quick five-day turnaround against St Kilda at Optus Stadium.

Brisbane looms after that eight days later, giving Pearce plenty of time to shrug off the injury for the top of the table clash.

“Hopefully it’s only one week. Medials can turn around really quickly,” Longmuir told ABC Radio.

“The longer break into that one week is a little bit more time.

“It’s too early to say, but if it’s not one, we are expecting it to be no more than three max.

“I know Alex has had his issues and sometimes he’s not the best one to go off his average games range, but we are just hoping it’s one.

“Clear he is an important player to us not only the way he plays which is really proactive and physical, but also his leadership has been outstanding. Fingers crossed on that one.”

Pearce suffered the injury in a contest in the last minute of Thursday night’s win over Hawthorn at Optus Stadium.

“Pleasingly scans have shown it’s not a significant injury,” Fremantle head of football Joe Brierty said.

“Early signs are positive and we will continue to reassess Alex’s functionality and provide further updates as they come to hand.”

Asked if he would rest sore players over the next two weeks given they have just come off three successive six-day breaks, Longmuir said: “It’s tempting but we haven’t really got a lot of sore players.”

“We’ve been able to manage players really well thoughout the week, especially through this tricky period, dropped our training loads a little bit,” he said.

“Coming off a nine-day break, Thursday into Sunday, I don’t think too many players will be putting their hands up for a spell. With the age of our group we can probably push through.

“The five-day break is tricky but we have always been able to manage players in game as well with the five on the bench.

“Some of our players aren’t playing as much game time as they would have played last year.

“If they are on the field they are not playing 100 per cent midfield minutes, which they would dhave done last year as well.

“I feel like our players are in a good space physically.

“I’m not saying we are not going to do do it definitely won’t be many if we do.”

Pearce, who has been in All-Australian form, damaged the knee in the final play of the game, when his foot got trapped attempting to tackle Hawthorn’s Connor Macdonald.

He looked in significant discomfort in the rooms post-game.

Oscar McDonald, Josh Draper and Hugh Davies will all be in the mix to replace Pearce.

Pearce missed the entire 2017 season after fracturing the same broken leg that had ended his season after eight games in 2016, while he also missed the 2020 season with a broken ankle.

He played just 10 games in 2021 due to a knee injury and missed eight games last year with bone stress in his lower leg.