Steve Clifton and Orren Stephenson suffered near-identical broken cheekbones, which threaten to have significant ramifications to their respective sides.

Clifton and Stephenson had surgery on depressed fractures on Sunday and will now race to be fit in time for crucial upcoming matches.

Lake Wendouree’s Clifton sustained the injury late in the final quarter of Saturday’s 41-point win over Redan, with Lakers’ senior coach Gavin Webb expecting the former Greater Western Sydney player to miss a maximum of two matches.

Webb believed it wasn’t out of the question for Clifton to return in round 18.

The Lakers initially held fears the star midfielder’s injury would impact their finals campaign, but Webb had no doubt he would be right for the playoffs following what he described as a “minor” incident.

“He’ll be ready to go (for finals),” Webb said.

“Best case scenarios a week, at most he’ll miss two – he’ll be fine.

“This was very much on the minor end of it … he’ll be back before we know it.”

Similar could be said for Stephenson, who left the field early in Saturday’s VFL clash with Sandringham.

Roosters coach Marc Greig said the decorated ruckman was a chance to return for the team’s round 21 clash with Frankston – a match that will likely decide the wooden spoon.

North Ballarat is unlikely to be pushing Stephenson for a quick return. Greig said he would leave the decision on when to play up to the 34-year-old, but admitted he would need everything to go right in his recovery to be a chance to face Frankston in the last game of the campaign.

“Everything would have to go to plan if he was to play,” Greig said.

“Put it this way, I’m not going to push him to play. But he’s a pretty resilient fellow so if he really thinks it’s worth it and wants to play a game then he’ll play.”