Melbourne Storm may be forced to open the NRL season under-strength with a number of stars still battling to recover from injury.

With the countdown on until their round one clash with arch rival St George Illawarra on Friday March 13, representative forwards Brett White, Sika Manu and Jeff Lima, NSW back Anthony Quinn as well as Steve Turner and Will Chambers are all still under injury clouds.

After a first-up 24-12 loss to the Warriors, the Storm are preparing for their second trial, against Newcastle in Melbourne on Saturday night where World Cup players such as skipper Cameron Smith, Greg Inglis and Billy Slater will have their first outing.

"All the guys who didn't play last week, who are available, they'll play this week," coach Craig Bellamy said.

However a number of positions remain up for grabs, with injury making it difficult to establish Melbourne's best line-up.

"Obviously there's a few players who have left the club and we have some holes to fill and we haven't decided who's going to fill those holes," Bellamy said.

"But we've got those games and another few weeks of training to sort it out."

NSW winger Quinn (Achilles) is still unable to run at full pace while fellow winger Turner was unable to complete training and White walked gingerly on his foot, which required off-season surgery.

The injury to Quinn, who also went under the knife, has proved the most frustrating.

"Sometimes he can train flat out and sometimes he can't so it's a bit of an issue," Bellamy said.

"We didn't think it would be an issue (for round one) before but it's been hanging around for a while."

Quinn is one of a number of players putting his hand up to play in the centres, left vacant with the departure of Israel Folau to Brisbane and the retirement of veteran Matt Geyer.

Bellamy said youngsters Joe Tomane, Willie Isa and Dane Nielsen will all spend time there on Saturday night at Princes Park.

"Willie Chambers, we want him to be right for the start of the season because he's missed a lot of footy so if he doesn't play this weekend he'll play against the Broncos and we'll see how he goes there."

Chambers, from Nhulunbuy in the Northern Territory, held down the position for the first 10 rounds of 2008 before a season-ending knee injury.

Bellamy is also on the look-out for another five-eighth so he can move Inglis back to his favoured centre position.

His first plan fell over when recruit Arana Taumata was sacked by the club earlier this month after an off-field incident.

But Bellamy said he would happily send Inglis on in the No.6 jersey again.

"I've said all along that we will play Greg where he fits best in to our team," he said.

"If we find someone else who can play in the five-eighth spot better than Greg, than we'll go with him."

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