The Bowral Blacks have suffered a huge blow on the eve of their round eight match against Engadine tomorrow with Andy Glenn retiring from the game.
The representative winger suffered another season-ending knee injury during last week's win over Vikings, rupturing his medial ligaments.
It is the third time the 25-year-old has suffered such an injury and as a result he has been advised to give up playing contact sport.
Bowral co-coach Craig Clothier said Glenn's presence in the side and pace and skills would be sorely missed.
"It's a tragedy for Andrew and a tragedy for the club," he said.
"We now have to try and work out someone to fill in for Andy at outside centre and it's not going to be easy."
Glenn's premature retirement comes on top of fellow top grade wingers Ben De witt and Trent Rengger leaving the club in recent weeks and leaves a shortage of experienced outside backs.
The evergreen Rob Taylor is still unavailable with a foot injury and one option for Clothier and co-coach John Rolles is to shift Tim Carney to outside centre and promote someone from second grade to play on the wings.
The coaches have yet to finalise on the starting 15 for tomorrow's match at Eridge Park, where the second-placed Blacks will take on the struggling Engadine-Heathcote club.
Engadine have found the step up to first grade tough going this season, scoring only eight points and letting in 279 in six losses.
Bowral meanwhile have won five from the same amount of matches and the form points toward an easy victory to the Blacks on Saturday.
But Clothier has warned his side about going into the match complacent and he said sometimes the games you are expected to win are the hardest to play in.
"We've really got to be focussed and switched on because it's one of those games where I expect to win easily," he said.
"It's a really awkward game for a team like us, because if you beat them by lots people are going to say well you should have done that and if you only just beat them they're going to ask what are you doing?
"It's a different sort of pressure playing against the lower sides in the competition."
Making Clothier and Rolles even more wary of the Southern Sydney side is the fact they have never seen them play and have no idea what they're capable of.
"I suppose we have to focus on our job more than anything else, because of the fact they're struggling and because it's a side we haven't seen before" Clothier said.
"It's really hard to put together a game plan when you have no idea what you're coming up against.
"Most importantly we have to maintain our discipline, because in a game like that you have a tendency to drop down to their level sometimes."
Clothier would like to see the backline recieve more ball in tomorrow's match but not at the expense of the side's game plan of winning the breakdown.
"There's the potential to try and take the easy way out without working for it.
"So you have to ensure the backs are getting the ball going forward rather than just giving it to them when it's not right."
The rugby action starts at 12.50pm tomorrow with third grade taking on Avondale, followed by the first and second grade matches against Engadine, while colts have a bye.
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