DEFENDER Caleb Marchbank is making considerable progress in his return from a serious injury, and it’s not going unnoticed by his teammates.

After spending months in a brace, Marchbank has made a steady progression in pre-season training after sustaining a neck injury in Round 16 last year. 

Although Marchbank was unable to train at the beginning of pre-season due to the nature of the injury, he has impressed teammates and coaches alike with his motivation and application.

Teammate and fellow defender Jacob Weitering commended Marchbank not only on his physical recovery, but his input as a leader while he has been injured. 

“The way he has attacked his rehab and the way he’s gone about himself around the Club has been terrific,” Weitering said.

“He’s staying involved with the back line, he’s helping out plenty of the boys in a leadership capacity.”

Since arriving at the Club, Marchbank has proven to be an integral part of Carlton’s defensive set-up, with his intercept game shining through against Collingwood (Round 8) and Fremantle (Round 15) in 2019.

Weitering says the manner in which Marchbank is training to get back to full fitness will give him every chance to be ready for the commencement of the 2020 season.

 “Physically, he’s out on the track running a little bit, getting some skills in,” he said. 

“He does 1000 steps just about every second day so he’s doing a really good job.” 

Director of High Performance Andrew Russell said earlier in the week that he expects Marchbank to be integrated into the full program within 2-3 weeks and available come Round 1 of the home-and-away campaign.