Meg Lanning is expected to play in Sunday's crunch World Cup clash with hosts England, but coach Matthew Mott has flagged the possibility of resting the captain and her troublesome right shoulder at least once more before the semi-finals.
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Australia's in-form skipper missed Wednesday's massive win over Pakistan with the ongoing issue, believed to have stemmed from a torn shoulder cartilage suffered last year.
She has assumed only light training duties since arriving in England, and has been unable to throw overarm for most of the past year. Lanning will sit out this year's English Super League in a bid to heal her shoulder ahead of the Ashes in Australia, which begin in October.
Mott said keeping her out of the Pakistan game was a precautionary measure as part of an ongoing management plan for the injury.
"We always envisaged that she was going to miss a game or two through the tournament, just through trying to manage the shoulder," Mott said.
"It was a conservative decision [to miss the Pakistan game], I think she'll be fine going forward. It's game by game. We'll try and get her up for England and then if things go our way there might be an opportunity to give her another rest.
"It's all on her and how she's feeling at the time. It is quite painful, so the less we can aggravate that the better.
"That's been hard for her but she's a very tough character and we've been able to manage her through the best we can."
Lanning scored a dashing 152 not out to help beat Sri Lanka in round two, but was visibly in pain while batting against New Zealand on Sunday where she made 48.
Should she line up against England in Bristol, Lanning would have had a full week between games to ice her shoulder.
Rachael Haynes deputised as skipper in Lanning's absence instead of vice-captain Alex Blackwell, which Mott put down to a leadership policy adopted by the side in the lead-up to this tournament.
"We spoke to Alex six weeks ago and of course she wanted to be captain but the way she's handled the situation has been exceptional. She's an ultimate team player and she understands the reasons why we've gone with that model," Mott said.
"She's just trying to bring everything she can to the vice-captaincy and she continues to do that. We felt that Rachael was very similar in her style to Meg, and that leadership model was something that we wanted to keep together.
"She's obviously had success for Victoria back in the day. One of the reasons we got her back into the squad was her leadership and what she brings to the team.
"I think she's going to be a captain of the future. We have to play things by ear with Meg and how long she can keep persisting with this shoulder injury. She [Haynes] is a long-term option for us."
England jumped to third in the World Cup standings with an authoritative showing against previously unbeaten South Africa on Wednesday, sizeable hundreds to Tammy Beaumont (148) and Sarah Taylor (147) setting up a mammoth 5-373.
South Africa chased the total valiantly but fell 68 runs short, allowing England to keep the heat on unbeaten pacesetters Australia and India.
"They're [England] a very good team, we've had great battles with them over the last couple of years. They're a side that's rebuilt really well and I think they're playing a really attacking brand of cricket," Mott said.
"We've had a reasonable run against them in one-day cricket over the last couple of years. It'll be a hell of a game and we're really looking forward to it."
