THE promoters of next Saturday's Hall Of Fame tribute match will earn their money in the coming days, as organisers face the devastating prospect of having no Jonathan Brown or Gary Ablett line up for Victoria.

Brown, the Victorian captain, and Ablett have featured heavily in the advertising campaign for the historic encounter, but both are in doubt after missing Geelong's hard-fought 27-point win over the Brisbane Lions yesterday.

Simon Black, a third withdrawal at Skilled Stadium, has already been ruled out of the Dream Team with the early signs of osteitis pubis, which coach Leigh Matthews said was being "nipped in the bud" but would still need several weeks' rest. And Luke Hodge will also miss the game for Victoria after injuring a hamstring in Hawthorn's victory over Collingwood.

Brown flew home with his teammates last night to receive treatment on a right quad injury, but is expected to return to Melbourne for assessment on Tuesday.

Ablett pulled out at midday with calf soreness, which his coach Mark Thompson said would make him "pretty unlikely" to play on Saturday night. Thompson, of course, is also the Victorian coach, and could be forgiven for wearing an I-knew-something-like-this-would-happen expression last night.

Of Brown, Thompson said: "I half-wanted him to play today so he'd be right for the Vics, but I was very happy as the Geelong coach that he wasn't because they're easier to beat without him there.

"I hope he's OK, he might be very similar to Gary — touch and go whether he plays. If he is injured, he shouldn't play — and we shouldn't put it upon him to play — and he should be right for Brisbane the week after."

Matthews said Brown was "a big boy" who would make the decision on his availability. "If they want to check with our medical people, they will, but I'm told they pick the two squads of blokes they think will be available and their medical staff do the assessment.

"He's captain of the Victorian team. Most people would want to play if they were captain of Victoria, that's a pretty big honour. I guess if he's fit and well, he'll play; if he's not fit and well, he won't play, and we'll hope like hell he gets through the game if he plays."

Matthews said Black had shown the first signs of osteitis pubis at the end of last Sunday's win over Melbourne at the Gabba, but that it was a "first-third of the year" injury.

"If it was the last third of the year, you'd probably put them out there and plug away, but we've got to try and get him over it. He was fairly debilitated the second half of last year with something like that."

About 25,000 tickets have already been sold for the Hall of Fame match.

Thompson agreed that Geelong's first quarter yesterday was terrible, with the Cats going inside their forward 50 only seven times to Brisbane's 20 — a first in a couple of years, he said — and losing the early tackle count 25-9.

"The focus during the week was to try and have a good start and we certainly didn't. It was one of our worst quarters of footy for a while, I'd think. That's OK, we bounced back."

Matthews paid credit to his players — who were level with the Cats early in the last quarter — and said he was proud of their efforts after playing in 30-degree heat six days earlier.

"We had an extremely hot Sunday afternoon last week and a short break, that might have been a factor," Matthews said. "It might just have been that Geelong could play high tempo for longer.

"We've come down here a bit in the last two or three years and been made to look like a second-rate team. Today, I thought they were good. We just couldn't quite nail enough shots and play the 120 minutes out strongly.

"When so much of your leadership isn't there, and one of your power forwards isn't there, it's easy to emotionally give it away."

As his premiership team takes a break in its defence with a 7-0 record, Thompson said it had enjoyed "great patches" in 2008 but was yet to play its best football.

"We're learning to cope with what the opposition's throwing at us on a weekly basis, and where football's changed from last year. Teams are certainly defending with more method, and certainly attacking — the game's quicker, more goals are being scored and there's more entries."