SYDNEY coach John Longmire says the absence of Melbourne skipper Max Gawn due to injury will be one of many factors the Swans consider when picking their side for Sunday's blockbuster against the Demons.
Spearhead Lance Franklin is set to return from his one-game suspension, leaving Longmire and his match committee with a selection dilemma.
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With young talls Logan McDonald and Joel Amartey kicking five and four goals respectively against Hawthorn on Sunday, there is the suggestion Hayden McLean, who was back-up ruckman to Peter Ladhams in the opening two rounds, could be the one to miss out.
"Lance trained today and he trained well, so we expect hopefully he gets through the week and comes back into the team and then we've got a decision to make as far as our ruck situation," Longmire said.
"Peter's been good, who's our second ruck, do we go tall, do we need more runners on the MCG?
"Whilst he (McLean) hasn't hit the scoreboard like Joel did on the weekend, he's been able to do the second ruck role for us as well.
"That's something we'll weigh up this week, whether we want to go with the extra height or we go smaller and run."
Melbourne will be without their senior ruckman Gawn due to a knee injury, but have another All Australian to call on in the form of Brodie Grundy.
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"We'll take everything into consideration," Longmire said of Gawn's absence.
"What we do know is Grundy is an All Australian ruckman so they lose one star ruckman and replace him with an All Australian gun.
"There's not may teams have that luxury. They get Grundy in the ruck and their midfield won't fall off much at all because of the quality they have in replacing Gawn.
"(Grundy) will do big minutes, he'd do the majority of the game, I assume, this week. So we'll take that into consideration.
Sydney lost the clearances in each of their first two games and Longmire acknowledges it's an area for improvement.
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"The good thing from last week is that they (Hawthorn) didn’t have so many effective clearances, the distance that they got from clearance and the scores from clearance," Longmire said.
"We just want to make sure that we keep applying enormous pressure around the ball and if things don’t go well, then we’re able to recover our position and be able to get in a strong position to be able to attack off the back of it."
