Essendon coach, Matthew Knights, faces the toughest selection week of his career after confirming that Adam McPhee will return from suspension and a number of big name players have become available after recovering from injury.
 
Knights told media this morning that there will definitely be changes made to the 22 to play North Melbourne on Sunday despite an excellent team performance against Carlton.
 
“It was a superb effort by the 22 who played (against Carlton), but McPhee played really well the week before and against Port, he played a good game, he had two quality weeks before being suspended. I would have thought definitely he’d come back into the 22,"" Knights said.
 
“It’s really healthy, it’s probably not something over the past 12 months that we’ve had, a healthy situation where we’ve got three or four guys putting their name up for selection and that puts pressure on the selected team.
 
""Mark McVeigh will definitely come into the equation, he’s definitely put his hand up to play, Sam Lonergan is physically right to play, Adam McPhee comes back from suspension and Michael Quinn has recovered from his bout of gastro which knocked him around for a few days.
 
""Then Nathan Lovett-Murray and Bachar Houli played really good football in the VFL. Those six names will definitely come up in selection.""
 
 
Knights acknowledged the efforts of his 22 players from Saturday night but predicted there will be some unlucky Bombers that miss on Sunday.
 
“It’s not great at any time to speak to a player and say you’re not in the senior 22,"" he said.
 
""There will potentially be a couple of players who will be a little bit stiff, whether they miss out because they didn’t come into the team or whether they miss out because they were in last week’s 22 and don’t get selected. “

Despite the excellent result, Knights says the club has quickly focused on the clash against the Kangaroo’s at Etihad Stadium.

“We won a crucial game on the weekend that was really good for our whole club. We enjoyed it in the moment, but then within 20 minutes we were in the coaches rooms speaking about the week coming. We re-focus really quickly and that’s really important for us to do that,” he said.

“I had a brief look at the Kangaroo’s team this morning, Harvey, Wells, Campbell, Thomas- They’ve all got enormous leg speed and it’s not something we’re going to underestimate. We’re certainly going to be paying those guys a lot of respect as they are quality players.""

All Essendon training sessions this week will be open to the public due to the school holiday period. The training sessions are Thursday at 10.30am and Saturday at 10.00am at Windy Hill.