Biglands has sought several different medical opinions and won’t make an official announcement until later this week, but results are expected to confirm that the 30-year-old has again torn his anterior cruciate ligament.
Coach Neil Craig conceded that it was likely Biglands would spend a second-consecutive year on the sidelines.
“It’s not good news,” Craig said.
“But because of the importance of the outcome, we’re just making sure that we get as much information as we can and all the information we need.
“So, its not good news at this stage, but we should be able to give you an answer in the next two or three days, and hopefully it will be good for us.”
“We’ve got the surgeon’s advice and we’ll double check that and get different opinions there, but if they all start to say the same thing then we’ll make a decision.”
Adelaide’s number-one ruckman was putting on a brave face on Sunday as he joined his teammates at the airport for the trip to Dubai.
But at, 30, and baring fresh scars from one knee reconstruction, Biglands faces the possibility that the injury could be career ending.
“If Rhett has a reconstruction, it means he would’ve had two years out of the game and obviously we all know that Rhett is towards the end of his career, but that doesn’t mean he’s finished,” Craig said.
“What I do know is that the way he rehabbed last year was absolutely outstanding. He couldn’t have done any more than he did and he will be faced with another rehab if he goes down that path. I’m sure he’ll tackle it in the same manner.
“As you can imagine he’s extremely disappointed, but I spoke to him two days ago and he’s pretty clear. He understands that there was never any guarantee and once he gets the information he’ll just get on with life and do whatever he needs to do.”
Biglands’ injury is a big blow for the Crows who lost ruckmen Ben Hudson and John Meesen during the off-season.
If Biglands is indeed sidelined for 12 months the ruck duties will fall to youngsters Jon Griffin and Ivan Maric and also the untried Kurt Tippett and Brad Moran.
“It leaves us very inexperienced in the ruck,” Craig said.
“It will be an interesting situation this year with inexperience in the ruck and all of new, younger players coming to our club, but I’ll hone in on the positives on it.”
“In our final decision to trade Ben Hudson we obviously looked at the worst case scenario, like if a Biglands doesn’t come up, and it’s the same situation we’ve looked at with Trent Hentschel.
“We haven’t based our forward line around Trent because we don’t know if he’s going to be able to come back or when he’s going to come back. Rhett’s injury certainly wouldn’t have changed our decision with Ben.”
