Coach Brenton Sanderson has guaranteed Sam Jacobs will lead Adelaide in the ruck against Fremantle at AAMI Stadium on Saturday.

Tickets for the clash are available at afc.com.au/tickets

Jacobs was substituted in the third quarter of the Crows’ come-from-behind win over North Melbourne after a quiet first half. The 2012 All-Australian nominee was one of the Club’s best performers against St Kilda the week prior and Sanderson backed the 25-year-old to respond on Saturday.

“We’ve still got lots of faith in Sam,” Sanderson said on Wednesday.

“He didn’t have his best game on the weekend and, yes, we subbed him out. I thought he’d turned the corner a bit with his form the previous two weeks. We’ll back him in this week. He’ll certainly play and he’ll be the first ruck at the first centre bounce.

“We need ‘Sauce’ at his best for us to play well and I’m sure we’ll get a much-improved performance this week.”

The Dockers have had their own ruck challenges this season, having lost Aaron Sandilands (hamstring) and Jon Griffin (knee) and also pinch-hitter Kepler Bradley (knee) to long-term injuries.

Freo will also be without captain Matthew Pavlich (Achilles) this week, but Sanderson said the well-drilled Dockers, who currently sit in fourth place on the AFL ladder, would still be tough to beat.

“They have some great talent out of their side, but they’ll probably get Stephen Hill (quad) back this week and he’ll be another headache for me,” Sanderson said.

“They’re a really hard side to play against regardless of who is in the team because they’re so well structured. We really rate Fremantle. They are so well coached and are a very disciplined outfit.

"We’ll take a bit of confidence into this week because we beat Fremantle three times last year.

“I guess we’re one team that does take them on … we back ourselves in. We'll have to be at our best to beat them."

This week’s match is likely to be a direct contrast to the shootout against the Kangaroos.

Fremantle is the best defensive team in the competition, allowing the opposition an average of only 40 inside 50m entries per game.

“Freo will try to lock us away but we can’t just cop that … we’ve got to try to take the game on. As well as they set up, we can’t allow them to turn the game into a defensive battle,” he said.

“This week will be a really good test of our attack against a really good defensive side, and next week we play Sydney, who do exactly the same.”

Despite not being completely happy with Adelaide’s thrilling win over North Melbourne, Sanderson described his team’s performance over the past month as “much better”.

He identified contested ball and stoppage work as two areas that still needed improvement.

“There are lots of little things we need to get better at. If you’re going to be a top-four side, you have do those things consistently well each week and at the moment we’re not,” he said.

“Currently, we’re the fourth-youngest side in the AFL. On the weekend, only GWS, Gold Coast and Port were younger than us. With a young side and they’re going to show some inconsistencies at times.

“We’ll keep backing them in.”