Brad Miller has been urged to reinvigorate his AFL career and do the same to Melbourne's forward line in the absence of David Neitz and Russell Robertson.

The bottom side must rejig their attack for the second half of the season in the wake of Neitz's injury-enforced retirement and the season-ending Achilles injury suffered by Robertson last Sunday against St Kilda, starting Monday against Collingwood.

As coach Dean Bailey sifts through his options, forwards coach Josh Mahoney is pushing for Miller, who has been switched from both ends throughout his 100-game career, to be deployed solely in attack.

Miller said last week he wanted to succeed Neitz as Melbourne's go-to man, after a six-and-a-half season career as a largely unfulfilled talent for a player measuring 194cm and 96kg.

Mahoney said that statement was the sort of declaration he wanted to hear from Miller, who he believed was a better forward than defender.

"He's shown he's found himself very comfortable in the forward line and he can play an important role for us there," Mahoney said.

"He's also in our leadership group and it's the perfect next step for him to say something like that, that he wants to accept more responsibility and demand more of himself game day.

"That's perfect, because we'd love for him to go to that next level because he's more than capable of it.

"With the injuries that Melbourne have suffered over the last few years with key defenders, he's been forced to go back.

"But I think he's more comfortable as a forward and I definitely like having him in my forward line, so I'll be pushing for him to stay forward as long as he can."

Matthew Bate looks set to join Miller in attack after being cleared of a serious hand injury, but goalsneak Aaron Davey will need to pass a fitness test before he is cleared to return from a hamstring injury for the Queen's Birthday clash.

Mahoney, in his first season as an assistant coach, said he did not realise initially what a giant hole the loss of Neitz and Robertson - and their combined 1,030 goals - left.

"Those guys have been in that forward line for over 10 years and I probably didn't realise the enormity of what's happened the past couple of weeks," he said.

"All of a sudden the two mainstays of our forward line aren't there.

"But it's important those guys remain involved as much as they can for the second half of the year and I see them assisting me in working with the young forwards and ... using their experience to fast-track some of our young guys."

Mahoney said Melbourne would consider taking Cameron Bruce and Brad Green away from the midfield to use them as specialist forwards against the high-flying Magpies.

But he said the bigger-bodied Michael Newton and Paul Johnson, along with last year's draftee Addam Maric and defender Colin Garland, loomed as potential long-term forwards.

In the meantime, the Demons appear set to rotate players through the forward line in the short-term to determine who can cut it.

"The advantage of our forward line is that it's going to very unpredictable and it's going to vary from week to week and even the target, the one the guys are kicking to, is going to be different all the time," Mahoney said.

"So maybe that's an advantage when sometimes you come up against other teams who have got one target and you know the ball's going to go there."

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