But coach Andrew Gower said his vice-captain may be forced to bat on should the result be in doubt in the final hour at the NTCA Ground.

Taylor is still nursing a sore head nearly a week on since he was floored behind the stumps keeping up to fast bowler Shaun Redman.

The 23-year-old was hit on the Raiders badge of his helmet after a deflection went astray. Play was stopped for 10 minutes and Taylor was taken to hospital for observation as a precaution.

He has been reduced to light training with the gloves this week and did not bat in the nets, but after suffering from headaches a scan on Thursday has cleared Taylor of any serious injury.

“We’ll find out more [on Saturday]” Gower said, “but he’s probably unlikely to field and will bat only if required.”

The home side can call on Greater Northern club keepers Tyler Dell or debutant Jono Marsden to fill the void.

Clarence is holding a tidy 85-run lead with three wickets in hand after the Raiders were bowled out for 107.

“The first hour’s important for us we get the three wickets – we can’t let the game get away from us,” he said

“We’ve got to make sure we go out there with the right attitude and knock over these last three batsman quickly.

“We just can’t let Clarence dominate that first hour and get a couple of hundred or so and put pressure on us.”

But at one stage, the final result looked to be swinging around in the Raiders’ favour.

After putting on 92 for the opening partnership, Clarence collapsed and was only 54 runs in front when the Roos lost a seventh wicket.

But Daniel Salpierto and Sam Rainbird added 37 inside the last hour in an unbroken eighth-wicket stand.

Gower has not totally discounted ambitions of pinching an outright win after losing on first innings points.

“If we happened to have a couple of set batters early on, you never know – you got to dream to be bold,” he said.

“That’s something that we’ll look at, but we’ll keep it pretty simple first.”

But Gower said adjusting from Greater Northern cricket to the Premier League has been an issue five rounds in.

“We haven’t been able to put a full day’s cricket together – that’s going to be a focus this week to put six hours together,” he said.

“We’ve played good periods in games where we have played well for two hours or even played four hours of good sessions, but we just haven’t been able to put six hours together.”