GWS are hoping to curb the influence of Collingwood’s Brodie Grundy by tag teaming Shane Mumford and Dawson Simpson against him, as they look to arrest their AFL slide.
Dawson and the recalled Mumford have never been selected in the same GWS side since the former joined the club before the 2016 season, but will both line up at Giants Stadium on Saturday.
“It’s going to be a huge challenge for our boys against the best ruckman in the competition, but we feel as though we can take it up to him,” Giants coach Leon Cameron said on Friday.
GWS weighed up the pros and cons of carrying a second ruckman against having another more mobile on-baller.
“We feel as though we’ve got enough run in our players to run the game out, time will tell,” Cameron said.
Cameron said Toby Greene, Lachie Whitfield and Daniel Lloyd could all spend time in the midfield on Saturday and possibly even Jeremy Finlayson and Harry Himmelberg.
Hit by a run of recent injuries to influential players, GWS have dropped three straight to fall to sixth and more losses would jeopardise their chances of making the finals.
“You can sit here and wallow in your own pity and make excuses,” Cameron said.
“We’re not going to use any excuses for us dropping off and we’re going to take it right up to Collingwood.
“They are a very very good team and we’re going to have our work cut out, but equally we look forward to that challenge.
“We need to make sure our connection centre forward needs to be a bit better and enable us to hit the scoreboard a little bit better.”
Collingwood coach Nathan Buckley suggested GWS were in a similar situation to his club last week, when they went into a grand-final rematch with West Coast under intense scrutiny following successive losses.
“If you look at a one-week snapshot of where we were with backs against the wall, that’s probably where the Giants are at the moment,” Buckley said.
“We look at the players that are available and they’ve got a lot of talent on the park and they’ve got a style that challenges everyone with the way they go about it.
“Our focus is largely going to be on ourselves and making sure that we bring our best to the table more consistently than we have in recent times.”
The loss of Levi Greenwood, Darcy Moore and Jamie Elliott to injuries have been balanced by the return of Jeremy Howe, Travis Varcoe and former Giant Taylor Adams.
Captain Scott Pendlebury has been listed to play despite suffering a broken middle finger in his left hand last week.