COLLINGWOOD is riding a wave of confidence going into Saturday night's clash with Sydney, according to midfielder Dane Swan.

Swan said the club's momentum had taken an upward swing since the Alan Didak-Heath Shaw drink-driving saga, with wins over St Kilda and Port Adelaide.

"Everyone knows what happened a couple of weeks ago and our form's turned around since then," Swan said yesterday.

"We've got a pretty young group and all the young kids have got a lot of confidence at the moment."

Further boosting the Magpies' belief is a five-match winning streak over the Swans, including a commanding victory in Sydney just last month.

Young midfielder-forward Dale Thomas is in doubt with a knee injury but Rhyce Shaw could return after serving a two-game ban for his role in the drink-driving incident.

"He's served his two weeks and he trained pretty strongly today," Swan said yesterday. "Obviously he's a great runner, he's one of those players that breaks the lines for us, so I'm assuming he's available for selection."

Collingwood has temporarily elevated emerging forward Brent Macaffer onto its senior list as a replacement for the injured Sean Rusling.

Macaffer, 20, who has been on the Magpies' rookie list for two seasons, has been in excellent form at VFL level, booting 37 goals in 2008, including 32 majors since round 10.

AAP