While Dean Polo's debut against Essendon – which saw him join Andrew Raines as the two Tigers already nominated for the award won by their teammate Brett Deledio last year – was still the talk of Tigerland on Tuesday, Wallace is already setting his sights on the Swans.
The Tigers defeated Sydney by a point at the MCG in their only meeting during the Swans' premiership year last year but will be boosted significantly for this year's clash.
Wallace has already declared Gaspar, out for the past three matches with a hamstring injury, a certain starter, which is a huge boost for the Tigers as Gaspar will almost certainly get the job of curbing Sydney dangerman Barry Hall.
And he is increasingly confident that skipper Johnson, who missed last week's win over Essendon with a far less serious hamstring injury than Gaspar, will also return to lead the side this week.
"It wasn't a strain or a tear (of the hamstring) as such, we erred on the side of caution last week but we are hoping he will play this week," Wallace said of Johnson.
"Our expectation is he will take part in our main training session tomorrow (Wednesday) and he was able to run both last Saturday and Monday."
Wallace said he was thrilled the Tigers were able to win such a tight game last week without Johnson and Gaspar and vice-captain Nathan Brown, who will be sidelined for at least another week as he continues strengthening his injured leg.
"We know we have still got a lot of ground to make up and last year we lost games to teams higher on the ladder and beat sides that were lower than us on the ladder," he said.
"We are doing the same thing again this year but we have done it with a lot more senior players out (through injury) and with a lot more young players in the side."
While Wallace was delighted with last week's win over Essendon, he said he was concerned by another last quarter fade-out from his team after the Bombers turned a 16 point deficit early in the final term into a ten point lead before the Tigers rallied to win.
The Tigers are yet to win a final quarter this season and Wallace admits he is searching for answers, fully aware that this week's opponents Sydney trailed by 33 points at three-quarter-time in last year's clash at the MCG before storming home to lose by only a point.
"We are looking at our last quarters and asking where, how and why (we aren't winning them),' he said.
"It's something we have got to be concerned about and will keep working on and we have done a bit of work with the players internally this week as to why we believe it's happening."
