MELBOURNE is preparing for one of its biggest challenges of 2024: the King’s Birthday clash against Collingwood.

It’s one of the league’s most highly anticipated matches of the fixture each year and 2024’s edition has even bigger stakes than normal.

Coming off the back of a 92-point loss to Fremantle last week, all eyes are on Melbourne to return to form with a win.

Senior coach Simon Goodwin joined media on Friday morning to preview the game, talk about how the team will prepare for the Pies and which players are in selection talks.

This week's media conference focuses are brought to you by Fujifilm. 

Neale Daniher | Big Freeze 10

"He's such an inspiration to us in so many ways," Goodwin told media. 

"One thing you learn from Neale really quickly is that in adversity or in your toughest moments, there's always an opportunity.

"What he's been able to do for MND and the fight against 'The Beast', he looked at what was possible, and was able to raise money to try and come up with a cure.

"And I guess for us listening to that message, what's our opportunity and what was our darkest moment in terms of the game that we played on the weekend?

"It was a perfect segue and a perfect lesson from Neale to to look at what's possible and the opportunity that sits in front of us."

The loss to Fremantle 

"The first thing is, you need to lean into it, you need to be vulnerable and understand that's not the way we want to be seen," Goodwin said. 

"The next part that comes is the ownership part, and the one thing that we've been able to create here over a long period of time is that when your supporters go to the game or anyone watching a Melbourne game, you know what you're going to go and watch.

"You're going to watch a highly competitive team that values certain elements of the game. And, on the weekend, we didn't do that.

"So, we need to own that. We need to be vulnerable, we need to lean in, and we need to get back to doing the things that we know we can do. We haven't lost our ability, we haven't lost the unity and the piece that that will drive that.

"But we need to create an identity that's going to be consistent, and that's what we've gone to work on this week, is to build that clarity, to build the consistency."

Collingwood rivalry 

"We've got a great rivalry with Collingwood, especially in the last few years [with] the type of games that we've been involved in," Goodwin said.

"But, King's birthday has always been a massive game. I've got enormous respect for Collingwood in the way they play, they're a really hard team to play against and they structure up really well.

"So, we know the challenge that sits in front of us, but we need to focus on us and  what we're capable of and the way that we want to play the game."

Selection talks | van Rooyen availability 

"Jacob van Rooyen is looking likely," Goodwin said. 

"We've got still got a fair bit of training to get through, obviously not playing 'til Monday. So, it's a big session today and Jacob will hopefully get through that.

"And then we'll have a pretty healthy list obviously available."