NSW skipper Boyd Cordner has declared his troublesome calf will be "good to go" in Origin III and won't prevent him from leading the Blues in their rare tilt at series clean sweep.
Cordner barely broke out of a jog in a non-contact opposed session at Coogee on Tuesday morning, the first training run for Brad Fittler's side since going into camp the previous day.
The Roosters second-rower ran on an anti-gravity treadmill as part of his recovery on Monday, but watched his teammates from the sidelines as they ran through attack and defence drills in front of reporters and fans 18 hours later.
With another eight days until game three, Blues officials have targeted Friday's field session for Cordner to return to training, and remain confident he will lead the team out at Suncorp Stadium,.
"I've got the luxury of a long week and we don't have our main sessions until Thursday and Friday and then obviously Sunday," Cordner told NRL.com.
"I've got a bit more time but the calf's sweet. I'm pretty confident I'll be right to go."
Cordner was man of the match when NSW wrapped up a rare series win in game two of the Holden State of Origin series and has been one of the best on field in both games so far.
Blues expect slater to come out firing
If the Blues can complete the sweep it would be the first 3-0 result since Queensland managed it in 2010 (the only sweep of their dominant past 12 years) and the first for NSW since 2000.
A late concussion suffered in a collision with Roosters teammate Dylan Napa meant Cordner was not on the field at full-time when NSW claimed their historic win.
He missed the Roosters' one-point loss to Melbourne five days later as a result of that heavy knock, however it is a niggling calf injury that he picked up in Origin II that has reduced him to limited training in the early stages of his team's game three preparations.
Fellow back-rower Tyson Frizell completed 10 minutes of light run throughs away from the main group at the end of Tuesday's session, but he is not in any doubt for the trip to Brisbane.
The Blues mainstay was rested from the Dragons' last-start win over Parramatta having carried a heavy playing load throughout this year's Origin series, and told NRL.com he "was just getting some extra movement through the legs after a week of rest".
