NORTH Melbourne will launch a three-pronged plan on Patrick Dangerfield to try to prevent Geelong's reigning Brownlow medallist from repeating past heroics.
Dangerfield's habit of pouring pain on rivals was heightened when the Cats met the Roos last year, gathering 48 disposals and kicking two goals in an extraordinary display.
Veterans Andrew Swallow and since-retired Nick Dal Santo both tried and failed to quell Dangerfield on that occasion and tagger Ben Jacobs (foot) is out this weekend.
"He was unbelievable (last year). We lost a few guys in the second half in that game and then he really got off the leash," Scott said of Dangerfield.
"I think Dal and Andrew Swallow were out there, but were injured. It's hard enough to go with Dangerfield when you're fully fit, let alone when you're hobbling around.
"We'll have probably three distinct plans for him and try and counter him.
"But people have tried lots of things against him in the past and he's a Brownlow medallist for a reason and probably favourite to do it again."
Scott was confident injury-cursed forward Jarrad Waite would be back on the field no later than round six from his latest setback.
Waite injured the AC joint in his left shoulder in the season-opening loss to West Coast last week, further souring an afternoon when he kicked just one goal from eight scoring shots.
"He was in really good touch in the off-season and had some designs on a full season," Scott said.
"We always thought if we could get Waite out there for a full season, he's still capable of career-best form.
"We've got a pretty good example so far of a similar injury Jed Anderson had in the pre-season and he got back quicker than we thought, so hopefully it's not too long."
Majak Daw, who could be a direct replacement for Waite in attack, is one of four potential additions for North Melbourne's clash with Geelong on Sunday.
"(Daw) kicked four goals in our elimination final loss last year, so we were hoping to get some really good continuity into him after that," Scott said.
"All things being equal, I think he would have played round one, but he's just had another interrupted pre-season, so he wasn't quite ready last week, but he's very close this week."
Ben Cunnington, Taylor Garner and Aaron Mullett are also in line to return, with Scott rubber-stamping the latter for a backline role.
"(Mullett) had a really solid pre-season, but then he had a bout of pneumonia, which set him back a month or so," Scott said.
"He was in really good touch on the training track through the pre-season and was really well prepared and missed out in round one just due to that illness.
"He's right to go again and played really well in the VFL last week, so we'll bring him into our team – we think he's a pretty important part of our back half."
