Maguire indicated that Luke Keary would take the No. 6 jersey in Sutton’s absence. “We’ll announce our team tomorrow, but Luke Keary has done a good job coming on as a replacement at five-eighth in recent weeks and we’re confident in his ability to get the job done while John is on the sidelines,’’ Maguire said. Meantime, Greg Inglis, who injured his knee in the State of Origin decider, started running last Friday and the superstar fullback may even be fit to face his former club Melbourne on Friday night, as the Rabbitohs try to avoid losing three out of four matches as finals loom. The Rabbitohs have won just one match since Inglis was ruled out, and on Saturday night lost 30-12 to North Queensland. Maguire revealed that Inglis' injury had been progressing well, although he said the club would not be pushing him to return early following Sutton's untimely injury. ''He's come along really well,'' Maguire said. ''He's running. We'll see how that goes.

''I've got some good performance guys, so you never know. I've just got to play it by ear. With this injury, it's one of those ones that you can start running, but you've got to have that confidence of being able to run on it as well. We've got to go through the whole process of getting him back up, and making sure he's 100 per cent when he comes back. ''We've got a big few weeks ahead of us, so we'll bring him back at the right time.'' It remains unlikely that Inglis will play against the Storm, on Friday night at AAMI Park. But fears that Inglis might be sidelined until the finals appear off the mark. Inglis should still play a significant role in the Rabbitohs' run home, which features tough matches against Melbourne, Manly, the Bulldogs, Wests Tigers and finally the Roosters. Sutton, meanwhile, said the swelling in his ankle had decreased since the match. ''These things happen, but hopefully it's not too bad, and I'll be right to go soon.'' Sutton, who has played a key role in the Rabbitohs' great season so far, maintained that his squad was enthused about their run home.

''It's a tough run home, but it's going to be a good test for us,'' he said. ''The boys are looking forward to it. ''It was disappointing [on Saturday] night, but we'll get over that very quickly, move on, and worry about Melbourne.'' Maguire added: ''Our players, they were very disappointed about that performance [on Saturday]. But if you look at a week before [against Gold Coast], we were a helluva lot better. It's just unfortunate that we didn't turn up from the kick-off. North Queensland, they came out very quickly, got us early, and we just couldn't pull ourselves back into the game. Loading ''We've just got to get back to how we play, and that's doing our job for each other.

''We just didn't put the pressure on North Queensland.''