Collingwood will rest a host of their ageing stars for Thursday night’s clash against Fremantle at Optus Stadium.

The Magpies, who are coming off a five-day break after last Saturday’s loss to Geelong, have decided to leave Scott Pendlebury, Jordan De Goey Brody Mihocek and Brayden Maynard in Melbourne.

Coach Craig McRae confirmed the quartet will not play when he faced the media on Tuesday.

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Mihocek, who is battling an abdominal issue, and Pendlebury were among the Pies’ best last week as they nearly pulled off a miraculous win before Jack Crisp’s shot after the siren missed.

Mihocek kicked four goals, including two in the closing stages, while Pendlebury racked up 26 touches and nine marks in another brilliant display.

But De Goey was well down on his best. Playing predominantly forward, De Goey had just nine touches and little impact on the match.

“They all won’t play - somewhat deliberate for most of them,” McRae said.

“Checkers has got a bit of an abdominal strain which will keep him out hopefully only for one week, we’ll see how that goes.

“And then the other three will be managed, and we planned this - it was a long time ago. We saw the draw when it came out and thought ‘let’s be strategic in this’.”

The Pies plan to use De Goey’s break from playing to bank aggressive training loads.

“Jordy’ll just be managed this game,” McRae said.

“We’re sort of like one step forward, one step back with Jordy at the moment, we’d like to be going a bit faster than what we are with him.

“But we’ve got to play the long game. We have patience ... because the plan is to get him going in the coming weeks, and this is part of that.”

McRae insisted De Goey wasn’t dealing with any further groin issues, but was building his loads.

“We’re deliberate in saying we’re not going to chase our tail,” he said.

“We’re going to just add his loads and training loads when we can.

“And this week is five days - it just doesn’t allow for that.”

Jeremy Howe, Lachie Sullivan, Ed Allan and Oleg Markov are all expected to come into the side.

Young key forward Charlie West appeared set to debut, but will have to prove his fitness after suffering a foot injury.

McRae is expecting a fired-up Fremantle, and a hostile environment at Optus Stadium, after the Dockers were battered by St Kilda.

He showed his players footage of Fremantle practicing contested work at training, along with Justin Longmuir’s post-match press conference.

The Dockers coach had said he wasn’t sure his team were up for the fight.

When asked which bits of Longmuir’s press conference he had shown, McRae said: “oh just the things that he said that was lacking.

“So if it’s lacking, you’d expect it to be there - or you’d want it to be.

“So we’re not going to shy away from what’s coming.”

- With AAP