Collingwood coach Nathan Buckley says the Magpies will need to "cobble up" a restructured forward line capable of hurting the Western Bulldogs in the absence of two of their prime operators.
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As they deal with four straight defeats, albeit against several of the league's top teams, the Magpies will spend considerable time this week devising how to ensure a forward line without power forward Travis Cloke and the smaller but equally effective Jamie Elliott will function effectively.
It won't be an easy task, for Cloke, nursing a strained calf, and Elliott, dealing with a stress reaction, are the club's two leading goalkickers, with 32 and 28 goals respectively.
The Magpies will need to find an answer quickly to remain firmly in finals contention, with Buckley of the opinion that the Magpies can do just that.
The focus will intensify on tall forward Jesse White to impose himself. White has endured an indifferent campaign - he is the club's third-leading goal scorer with 21 - and his form in the loss to the West Coast Eagles on Saturday was criticised after he finished goalless.
Buckley said the former Swan, whom he had urged earlier in the season to take a greater stand, would be one player the Magpies needed to look to.
"Jesse is going to be one of many that is focused and speculated on in front of the ball for us," Buckley said on Wednesday.
"He, Fas [Alex Fasolo], Jordan De Goey, Jarryd Blair, Ben Kennedy on the weekend, these guys - we will have to cobble up a front six that we know is going to get the job done in our offence but also put enough pressure on the ground.
"We have spoken about our double ruck [Brodie Grundy and Jarrod Witts] and the fact that we want to keep those two boys going, and we'll see that again. And we saw signs [from] Brodie Grundy, for instance, his forward play was a lot better last week, but he grassed four marks that we would have loved for him to take in the goal square."
The Magpies could also look to recall rookie Darcy Moore, who was goalless in his two matches against Hawthorn and Port Adelaide, while Ben Reid is likely to return through the VFL should he emerge unscathed from training on Friday.
"We don't have another Trav Cloke on our list. In the end, what we discover in the short term might actually be a better solution - you never know what you are going to find," Buckley said.
"As I said, a lot of our offence is away from the forward 50 and our ability to score starts around stoppage or starts from a kick out or starts from a really strong defensive mindset or mechanism that gives our offence a chance to kick off."
The Magpies will hope the ghosts of yesteryear do not return. They were 8-3 a year ago but dropped eight of their past 11 matches to miss the finals. This season they have dropped four straight since being 8-3, and rank 17th on the "form ladder" in this period, ahead of only Brisbane.
Scoring has emerged as a major issue. They had averaged 100.9 points per game until round 12 but this has been slashed to 70.8 in the past month. They had ranked second behind only Hawthorn for marks inside 50 until round 11 - they have since slipped to 17th, ahead of only the Lions.
The Magpies have also slipped considerably in turnovers differential, while the added pressure they have found themselves under is shown in that their kicking efficiency differential has dipped to minus 3.9 per cent since round 13 - ranked 17th.
The Magpies are likely to need to win five of their final seven home-and-away matches to ensure a September appearance.
The sixth-placed Bulldogs - the two clubs will battle for the Robert Rose Cup - will be a major challenge, but the Magpies then face Melbourne and Carlton.
