Melbourne midfielder Jack Trengove is edging closer to an AFL return after two years in the football wilderness.
Trengove, the second pick in the 2009 draft, hasn't featured at senior level for the Demons since round two of the 2014 season due to a chronic foot injury.
But after two operations to fix career-threatening bone fractures, the 24-year-old has strung together four games at VFL level this season.
Coach Paul Roos is heartened by Trengove's progress and said the next step is up to the former club co-captain.
"I had a chat to him last week and told that I'd purposely left him alone ... it's almost a case of him coming to us when he feels like he's comfortable and saying that he really wants to put his hand up for senior selection," Roos said.
"He's said that he's loving being back out there and I said to come and knock on my door when he thinks he's ready.
"Then (we'll talk about) what he really needs to work on to play AFL as opposed to just letting him play (VFL) and enjoy it.
"(But) it's a credit to him the way he's been playing."
After being knocked out early in his first VFL game of the year, Trengove has been named in Casey's best players for the past three weeks.
But Roos will continue to take a conservative approach with the talented onballer, who along with ruckman Max Gawn, are the only players still at the club from the 2009 draft.
The coach's more immediate concerns are planning for a rare trip to the Gold Coast to take on the Suns at Metricon Stadium on Saturday night.
Roos is demanding a more balanced approach from his side after they lost a shootout to St Kilda last weekend.
"Having opened up our scoring sometimes it opens up our defence," he said.
"I think we've spoken about balance here a lot, trying to get the balance right, and on the weekend we were still able to score and put pressure on but defensively we were really poor."
Melbourne and Gold Coast sit just outside the top eight with 3-3 win-loss records this season, but the Suns are coming off a 120-point mauling at the hands of Geelong.
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