FREMANTLE coach Justin Longmuir says he can "feel the frustration" of the club's fans after young star Andrew Brayshaw's failed Tribunal challenge, which will force a midfield reshuffle for Sunday's high stakes Wester Derby.

The decision to uphold Brayshaw's one-match ban for making contact to the eye region of Brisbane's Jarrod Berry has left the club disappointed and needing to replace its most in-form player.

Longmuir said a review of the Match Review and Tribunal systems was for others to have a view on, but it was questionable whether the current set-up was producing consistent outcomes.

"All I can probably say is I feel the frustration of our fans, and I know our fans are frustrated at Andy's one-week penalty," the coach said.

"When they look at other incidents that maybe get off or don't even get cited, I can understand their frustration.

"I think we should always be searching for the most consistent outcomes we can, and at the moment that's questionable."

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Gun Docker in MRO strife for this incident

Andrew Brayshaw in hot water for this incident with Jarrod Berry

Published on Aug 9, 2021

Longmuir said the Dockers would look to inject Connor Blakely and Darcy Tucker into inside midfield roles against the Eagles to cover Brayshaw, but it would not be easy to replace the 21-year-old.

The Dockers will also need to replace injured half-back Nathan Wilson (hamstring) with forwards Sam Switkowski and Bailey Banfield both ready to return from injury.

The coach said Fremantle's recent 14-day quarantine, which prevented players who missed AFL selection from playing in the WAFL, would make it harder to select potential debutant Nathan O'Driscoll.

Midfielder Luke Valente will also be unavailable to debut, with the third-year Docker remaining in South Australia.

"Not ruling him (O'Driscoll) out by any stretch. But the fact he hasn't played now for a couple of weeks probably doesn't set him up to succeed as well as we'd like," Longmuir said.

"But we haven't got a lot of depth either, so we'll weigh that up today at selection."

Fremantle's Nathan O'Driscoll warms up before the clash with Richmond in R20, 2021. Picture: AFL Photos

Recapturing the form they produced against Richmond in a four-point win in round 20 was the focus for the Dockers this week, addressing a drop off in the contest and their defensive pressure.

The Dockers won both the contested possession (+26) and tackle (+3) counts against the Tigers before losing them by six and 36 respectively against the Lions in round 21.

"It's been an issue for us all year, our tackling, and we need to keep continuing to improve on that," Longmuir said.

"Our pressure in our front half versus what opposition teams are doing in our back 50 is stark, so we need to set the ground up to allow our forwards to pressure more.

"Some of it is personnel and the age of our group. We're missing some easy tackles where it's just a strength battle.

"We need to make sure we get our young player in the gym and tackling with the right intent."

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Longmuir said the Dockers would use their 11-game losing streak against the Eagles in a small way as ammunition, but the players understood what was at stake.

Even if Fremantle wins its last two games, it will need to gain significant percentage across those matches against West Coast and St Kilda to play finals. 

"Our players know what's on the line, there's no more losing if we want to play finals," Longmuir said.