NORTH Melbourne's medical staff will closely monitor the fitness of midfielder Daniel Wells, utilities Michael Firrito and Leigh Harding, and draftee Jack Ziebell ahead of Sunday's clash with Essendon at Docklands.

Chief of football Donald McDonald told kangaroos.com.au that all four players would have precautionary scans before coach Dean Laidley and his match committee made decisions on their selection.

Harding (knee) and Ziebell (back) were casualties of last round's loss to Hawthorn while Firrito (knee, foot) and Wells (hip) have carried their injuries for longer.

It was initially feared that Harding had damaged the anterior cruciate ligament he had reconstructed in late 2006.

"The doc's going to do scans on his hip just to see how he is," McDonald said of Wells. "He's just been a bit sore for a couple of weeks so the boys are just going to check it out.

"We just want to make sure there's nothing there, that he doesn't have any sort of ligament strain around that region.

"We're hoping he's going to be available for Sunday."

McDonald added that Firrito had suffered a knock to his knee against the Hawks but his foot had been trodden on a few weeks ago.

"It's just restricted him a little bit," he said. "He's another one that (doctor) Con (Mitropoulos) wants to monitor and just see how he goes throughout the week with his training.

"We just don't want to take anyone into the game that's physically not right to go because the Bombers have shown they're a good running team."

Tall forward David Hale didn't train on Tuesday, however, McDonald confirmed that scans had cleared him of any harm from his concussion suffered on Sunday.

Hale wore the brunt of a marking contest between teammate Lachlan Hansen and Hawthorn's Jarryd Roughead and was taken from the ground on a stretcher.

"He'll be fine to play at this stage," McDonald said. "All we've got to do is make sure he gets through training and we'll find out more about that after our next training session.

"He'll train for the rest of the week so he should be alright."

Hansen limped around the Arden Street facilities on Tuesday morning but McDonald said he was only feeling the effects of a tumble from a strong mark in Sunday's game.

Small forward Ben Ross will also push for senior selection despite some hamstring soreness after VFL affiliate Werribee's practice match.

"He'll be right to play," McDonald said. "Just the conditions down at Werribee – the oval was pretty sandy by all reports.

"A few of those blokes that played on it, it just took the sting out of them a little bit."