Carlton will toss the challenge to young big man Jacob Weitering to help quell North Melbourne's tall forwards' threat at Etihad Stadium on Sunday.
Weitering must adopt a key defence role on either Ben Brown or Jarrad Waite following Blue Sam Rowe's season-ending knee injury.
"We think Weitering can hold his own down back," Carlton coach Brendon Bolton said.
"We know Alex Silvagni is playing really good footy.
"But more importantly it's about winning it around the contest so they don't get easy access.
"That's important for us, the team defensive action."
While Weitering has shown the ability to play down back, the compulsory shift of the 2015 No.1 draft pick robs the forward line of another major focus in a season when the young Blues are the lowest-scoring team in the AFL competition.
"We would prefer more goals, there's no doubt about that," Bolton said.
"It's a work in progress. We've got a really young forward line and our system is developing, so in time we think that will grow.
"In terms of the platform and building who we are as a team, we focused on defensive action and pressure as a start point.
"We're only a year into that change and in time that will make the progress we need."
An ankle injury to Liam Jones in the last minutes of a VFL game last weekend scuppered Carlton's plans to promote him as Rowe's backline replacement.
Jones will get the chance to resurrect his AFL career by stopping goals instead of kicking them when he returns from injury after the Blues' bye next week.
The 26-year-old, who under-performed as a key forward with the Western Bulldogs and Carlton, has shown promise in defence in the past month.
"Some times trial and error can end up finding something positive and we think in this case it has," Bolton said.
"But some time he has to do it at AFL level some time in the back end of the year," Bolton said.
"What we do know is he has explosive power. He's a power athlete and that allows him to get to contests quickly and he's good in the air. So, we'll see how that one unfolds."
While Blues ruckman Matthew Kreuzer's duel with Todd Goldstein is an appetising contest, Bolton said the ground level battles in the midfield were more important.
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