FREMANTLE heads to Melbourne to take on Carlton with some sore bodies, but remains confident of stopping the Blues midfield and returning to the winners list.

Before leaving Perth, assistant coach Peter German wouldn’t reveal which players were under injury clouds, but Josh Head and Ryan Murphy have travelled with the team as the 23rd and 24th men.

From last week's team that lost to the Western Bulldogs by three points, Roger Hayden (collapsed lung) and Marcus Drum (hamstring) go out, with young forward Chris Mayne and key defender Antoni Grover set to return.

It's good timing for Antoni as he gets to celebrate the AFL's Indigenous Round and is also likely to get the job on Brendan Fevola.

"We wouldn’t take him if we didn’t expect him to get up and he's one of our options on Fevola. We know he's important to the makeup of their side, so we'll weigh up all our options carefully," German said.

"Josh Head is travelling and is a good chance of playing. We have a couple of guys who we need to make sure are 100 per cent fit and there are slight question marks over them.

"Murph is strongly in consideration after good form the last couple of weeks and he could play forward."

Head is in his second stint on Fremantle's list after consistent form with WAFL club South Fremantle in recent seasons and the hard running and long-kicking left footer could make his AFL debut on Saturday.

His South Fremantle teammate Ryan kicked seven goals in the WAFL last week to put himself in contention. The Bulldogs will miss the pair this Saturday, though, as they take on the undefeated Subiaco.

Fremantle is concerned about the potency of Carlton's midfield, but is confident if its side can turn recent good form patches into a full game, a win won't be far away.

"A lot of their midfield has gone unnoticed by the media. (Kade) Simpson, (Heath) Scotland, (Marc) Murphy, (Nick) Stevens and (Chris) Judd are all in good form and can do some real damage, so we have to make sure our players get their hands on the ball and be accountable on their running midfielders.

"I'd say the midfield battle will decide the game. If they can supply Fevola enough, he'll kick a winning score and if we supply Pav (Matthew Pavlich), Taz (Chris Tarrant) and (Jeff) Farmer enough we will be a good chance.

"Our focus is on playing with the same intensity, amount of run and creative football for the four quarters, not just the three that we have in recent weeks."