Sydney's resilience and depth will be tested going into Friday's AFL grand final rematch after a freak injury robbed All-Australian defender Dane Rampe of the chance to make his 100th appearance.
Injuries to Rampe and midfielder Dan Robinson could force Sydney to look at blooding another youngster for Friday's Etihad Stadium encounter.
Rampe, whose streak of 98 straight games played was the longest at the club, suffered a broken arm on Monday, after mistiming a jump over a chain near the Swans headquarters and falling on concrete.
"He's got a crack just below his elbow, at this stage I've been told it's probably a minimum of five weeks (out)," Swans coach John Longmire said.
Promising Robinson is expected to be out for eight weeks after breaking his collarbone in last week's opening round loss to Port Adelaide.
He was sidelined for much of last season with the same injury.
Robinson and Rampe join an injury list already including Jarrad McVeigh, Isaac Heeney, Gary Rohan and Tom Papley, none of whom will be available this week.
"Reflecting on what happened to Dane this morning is that every club's resilience level gets tested over the course of the season," Longmire said.
"Our test is coming at the start of the year, both in our form on the weekend, but also a couple of things that are very difficult to control.
"You've just got to make sure you bounce back and ride those levels of tests as good as you can."
Key back Aliir Aliir, who started the season in the reserves after a toe injury kept him out of the club's early pre-season games, is a chance of replacing Rampe.
"His senior form last year was on the back of absolutely strong reserves form, he hasn't displayed that sort of consistency over the last few weeks, obviously has to be in the mix (for this week)," Longmire said.
He had no reservations about throwing a debutant into a big game provided they showed competitive instincts like impressive Port newcomer Sam Powell-Pepper did against the Swans.
He's more concerned about his team performing better in the contest this week than avenging their 2016 grand final loss..
"We need to play a better brand of football and win more contests, because we know one of the Bulldogs real strengths is their ability to be able to win those one-on-ones," Longmire said.
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