Essendon interim coach Dean Solomon explained Ben McKay's omission as a player who has lost confidence.
The Bombers went down to Adelaide by 72 points at Marvel Stadium on Sunday, and watched Crows big Riley Thilthorpe slot five goals.
McKay's last outing was against Hawthorn, where he gathered five disposals and struggled to contain the brown and gold, leaving teammate Zach Reid and Kyle Langford to man Thilthorpe.
"The reality is we don't have any talls in form that we could have brought into the team," Solomon said.
"The team that we put on the park today was the team that we have that are in form, especially from the talls.
"We spoke about it halfway through the third (quarter); there's absolutely no one that we could have brought in with any confidence, unfortunately, to match those big talls.
"I mean, he's one of quite a few players that have lost a bit of confidence. "It amazes me how much he gets singled out, Ben.
"I said during the week, I'll protect my players, and he's one that I will protect, and he's getting to work on his game."
McKay had the week off due to the VFL bye, but Solomon indicated he'd spend the next game in the reserves.
"He's going back; obviously we had a VFL bye this weekend, but he'll get to work during the week. He'll most likely play VFL next weekend," Solomon said.
"But he's got the hunger to work on his game and get back to a level that we know that he can.
"So I'm going to protect him, but his form last week against the Hawks suggested that we couldn't have selected him today.
"So the guys we did select, we backed them in and, as I said, there were patches that we liked, but their big guys got a hold of us at times as well."
It's the second time this season McKay has been dropped from the senior side. He's played 16 matches this year.
Youngster Angus Clarke will also enter concussion protocols after suffering a head knock, and has been sent to hospital with a sore neck.
Clarke has battled with injury in his second AFL season, and has played the last four games, but will miss at least next week's clash with Geelong.
"He gets back into the side, plays two or three, gets a head knock. There is concussion there," Solomon confirmed.
"But there's also soreness in the neck so they've taken him to hospital to check further, hoping there's no damage there. They're pretty confident he's fine, but it's frustrating for him.
"He's a good young man. He's hungry to play and showed good signs, and we're excited by that."
Clarke will also need a scan on his knee after he hyperextended it to "see what damage is there". He did return to the field after the incident.
Solomon was also quizzed on his coaching future.
"I'll have discussions with the club in the next couple of days and work through the bigger picture stuff," he said.
"But that's not the priority. It's really the players. We've got three games to go."
