Fremantle coach Justin Longmuir has lashed "incredibly unfair" criticism of Nat Fyfe and backed the dual Brownlow Medallist to respond to his disappointing first game as a full-time forward.
After an impressive pre-season, Fyfe's much-vaunted opening game against St Kilda fizzled into a relatively anonymous goalless, nine-touch effort, with the former Dockers captain shut down by Callum Wilkie in the 15-point loss.
But Longmuir disputed early suggestions the 31-year-old couldn't play in attack on a full-time basis.
"That's incredibly unfair," Longmuir said.
"He comes under the spotlight the way he does and I know he's set a high standard over the years and with that comes a bit more pressure and expectation.
"I heard a lot of talk after the pre-season games - 'he's going to kick 50-plus goals and win the Coleman' and then after one game he gets criticised as the worst experiment of all time.
"We won't be shifting him anytime soon."
Longmuir conceded it would be hard for Fyfe not to take criticism personally but stressed his forward craft was a work in progress.
"You can't click your fingers and become the forward he wants to become," he said.
"So he's got to keep working at it and just keep trusting in his pre-season form.
"I know it didn't work for him last week, it didn't work for us, and we didn't help our deep forwards as much as we could have. But I've got full faith he can turn it around."
Longmuir had no plans to move Fyfe back to the midfield but acknowledged he needed to work on knowing when to push up the ground or go deep forward to expose opposition defenders.
"It's interesting that they (St Kilda) probably put their best defender on him, so that shows how the opposition rate him and how they have rated him over the pre-season," he said.
"That should help others around him as well - it didn't on the weekend because we didn't take our opportunities.
"He's going to be valuable for us but he needs to be able to mix up his positions so he can take his defenders to vulnerable positions, so we'll keep working on him with that."
Longmuir was confident boom recruit Luke Jackson, who failed to take a mark on debut, would be better for the run.
Veteran Michael Walters (Achilles) is a "chance" to make his senior return against North Melbourne but Longmuir was adamant he wouldn't be reactive and make wholesale changes.
Walters was named as an emergency alongside key forward Josh Treacy, who was dropped from the starting 22.
Veteran ruckman Todd Goldstein has replaced injured Kangaroos teammate Tristan Xerri, with Aidan Corr recalled and Aiden Bonar dropped.
