Collingwood hopes star forward Jamie Elliott will return to full training by early January as he makes solid progress from back surgery.

The Magpies have been heartened by the advances the 23-year-old has made in the past month after having surgery in the middle of the season which coach Nathan Buckley described as "significant to put some support into a vertebrae".

Eventually diagnosed with pars defect injury, the back problem has forced Elliott to miss the whole season.

The club announced in May that he would need an operation to fix it.

Buckley said that no matter how you looked at it, the year had been disappointing for Elliott.

"Right now he has been through hell and back for a young player who has really high aspirations about what he wants to be as a footballer and what he wants to provide to the club," Buckley said.

The coach said the latest news on Elliott was positive.

"We're quite bullish about where he can get to and he will probably be in full training [at the] end [of] December or [in] January, but we have got plenty of time to graduate his load so that we can give him every chance of getting back to full fitness," Buckley said.

Elliott has been one of the Magpies’ best performers in recent seasons and his absence has had a critical impact on the club's performance.

He won the club's goalkicking last season with 35 goals and was in the top-two goalkickers at the Magpies between 2013-2015.

Collingwood's highest goalkicker in 2016 is Alex Fasolo with 25 goals.

Fasolo was ruled out for the rest of the season on Monday with shoulder surgery along with promising youngster Tim Broomhead.

Underlining the Magpies' form and injury woes is the fact that their next four leading goalkickers in Darcy Moore (21 goals), Jesse White and Mason Cox (17 goals) and Travis Cloke (15 goals) have not played more than 15 games this season while Dane Swan played less than one quarter.

Buckley's tenure has been hampered throughout by injury to key players but he says games missed this season have been due to impact injuries rather than the soft-tissue problems that bedevilled the 2014 and 2015 seasons.

"The injuries we have sustained this year have a very different profile to what we had through 2014 and 2015," Buckley said.

"They hurt just as much because they have been to key personnel, but you have got to find a way around it."