The Western Bulldogs must have found a few four-leaf clovers at the Whitten Oval this year.

As the team gets ready for its biggest test of the season, the Bulldogs charmed run of luck in terms of taking on opposition teams without their stars shows no signs of ending.

The second-placed Bulldogs - whose 13 wins and a draw from 15 games have seen them emerge as genuine chances to win their first flag since 1954 - travel to Geelong to take on the league leaders, who have now won 33 of their past 35 matches.

But they will face a Cats' side without Brownlow Medal favourite Gary Ablett and No.1 tagger Cameron Ling after both were injured in last week's bruising win over Fremantle.

The absence of Ling and Ablett continues the trend of the Bulldogs coming up against teams badly weakened by the loss of key players in recent weeks such as facing St Kilda without Steven King and Robert Harvey in Round 11, Brisbane without Daniel Bradshaw in Round 12, Collingwood without Josh Fraser, Leon Davis, Travis Cloke and Shane Wakelin in Round 13, Port Adelaide without Peter Burgoyne, Brendon Lade and Chad Cornes in Round 14 and Melbourne without Aaron Davey and Brock McLean last week.

But Dogs coach Rodney Eade said if any team can cope without two of its best players it is the all-conquering Cats.

"They've got a lot of depth," he said. "They're going to have two good replacements - (James) Kelly will be back and I think (Brent) Prismall is probably the other one."

This week is the first time the reigning premiers have taken on either of the true contenders this season, and as a result this clash and the following week's Hawthorn-Geelong match are the most eagerly-awaited games of the season to date. But because of the injuries to Ling and Ablett, it may not turn out to be a reliable guide to how the Cats and Dogs will fare against each other in September.

"We would probably prefer to play them at full-strength so we can get an idea where we're at," Eade said.

While the Cats-Dogs clash is easily the standout game of Round 16, it is just one of several intriguing clashes this weekend.

At the same time as the league's top two teams go head-to-head, 11th-placed Richmond and 12th-placed Essendon will do battle in front of a far bigger crowd at the MCG with the finals hopes of both clubs on the line.

With the finals race now wide open with just two games separating sixth-placed Adelaide from the 12th-placed Bombers, this week's round will go a long way towards shaping the eight with the injury-hit Crows facing a danger game against local rival Port Adelaide on Sunday while the eighth-placed Saints face a tough one against third-placed Hawthorn.

But two other teams just outside the eight in North Melbourne and Carlton also face difficult games against leading contenders Collingwood and Sydney respectively while seventh-placed Brisbane gets the chance to give itself some breathing space in the eight with a home clash against a West Coast side that has lost its past six games by an average of 11 goals.