Stuart Dew says poor decision-making around the contests is the reason the SUNS’ midfield has failed to fire over the past month.

After starting the season as one of the competition’s leading contested ball winners, the SUNS have now dropped to 10^th in the league, and are ranked lowest in uncontested possessions.

It’s something that has to change when the SUNS come up against the 2018 no. 1 ranked disposal side in Collingwood. 

“We’ve got to get our decision right of when to go in and when to stay out,” Dew said.

“I think a lot of our clips on Monday we had three or four on the inside and no cover on the outside.

“In terms of it being a worry, obviously Collingwood are really impressive in that regard.

“We’ve just got to get our balance right and guys getting those decisions of when to impact and when to cover.”

Collingwood represent a unique forward threat when they take to the field at Metricon Stadium on Saturday night. 

Pending selection, the Pies have rolled out a single tall forward in Mason Cox, but supplemented the forward line with dangerous medium and small forwards in Jordan De Goey, Will Hoskin-Elliott and Jaidyn Stephenson.

Dew says it presents a new challenge for the Gold Coast backline. 

“It is tough to match up on but I guess even within pre-season and training we get our guys to play on tall and small,” Dew said.

“Jesse Joyce has played tall and even Charlie Ballard a little bit last week got some good experience on (Jack) Gunston and (Jarryd) Roughead.” 

“We don't want to get too rigid in our match-ups because then you can get wheeled around a little bit." 

The SUNS coach says he’s challenged his side to show resilience against Collingwood and back themselves in to execute the game plan under pressure.

“On the back of a couple of heavy losses, when oppositions were able to get on top of us we identified that quite often we then really went back into our shells,” he said.

“So (we’re) just putting that preparation in around what it looks like when the opposition kick a goal but also when we’re trying to test the opposition. 

“We haven’t quite cashed in yet.” 

“We’re looking forward to a really good test against a side that has really delivered this year.”