Graham Rowntree is confident Sam Warburton will be fit to play at least one more match before the British and Irish Lions face the All Blacks in their three-Test series in New Zealand.
Skipper Warburton will miss Saturday's game against the Crusaders in Christchurch after suffering an ankle injury in the Tour opener last weekend, and Rowntree admitted the Lions have discussed contingency plans should the Welshman miss the first Test on June 24.
But the Lions' scrum coach revealed Warburton could even be ready to return for next Tuesday's clash with the Highlanders.
Rowntree explained: "To all the people back home, don't worry about Sam.
"We saw him in game one, he hurt his ankle a bit in that game. He's not able to train fully at the moment, but I've watched him train next to us, doing some rehab running, and he's working hard.
"He's just not able at the moment to do some of the twisting and turning off the line that's required for a high-intensity session.
"He's just having a few days out of the twisting and turning, but he's training hard."
And asked if Warburton could win Test selection without playing another pre-series warm-up fixture, Rowntree added: "No, we'll deal with that as and when it comes.
"At this point, I can tell you now, he's missed a couple of days' training, it's not a long-term issue. He won't be the only person who won't be training fully in the next five days.
"At this point, he's not training fully with us, because we don't want him twisting and turning and going off the line. But he's running hard."
Rowntree also revealed the Lions would be unfazed about their captaincy options, should Warburton not be in the frame to start the Test series.
He added: "There's a few candidates who we spoke about initially when we were talking about captaincy, so there's some other guys we could call upon.
"Of course we've spoken about that, and the potential of that happening. But luckily we've picked some good leaders in this tour squad, good leaders."
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