Next game: Sunday, November 1st vs. Minnesota
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MILWAUKEE - It's being called the most important, most anticipated regular season game in the history of the Green Bay Packers.

Packers Coach Mike McCarthy seems to give a much more ho-hum demeanor about Favreageddon II at Lambeau Field.

"I'm holding up fine. It's a normal Friday for us, from a work week standpoint," said McCarthy to Jagler and Mueller on 620WTMJ's "Wisconsin's Morning News."

"I get to talk to you fine gentlemen first thing in the morning, then I go to my 7:00 a.m. staff meeting, and roll in from there."

The point McCarthy is making is that he's focusing what it takes to defeat Brett Favre, Adrian Peterson and company, not the return of Favre to Lambeau Field for the first time since his movement to Minnesota.

"Ultimately, we need to focus on the football game. This is a football game we have to play a certain way, and that's what we're focused on."

Interestingly, his defense has to focus on stopping not only a quarterback with whom his team is so familiar, but a quarterback who is thriving in an offensive system which is so familiar - the same West Coast offense Favre used in almost all of his tenure with the Packers.

"I think he's doing the things he's done for so long. They're asking him to play in the concepts, the plays he's done for years, the uniqueness of those plays," said McCarthy.

"He has so much experience within those plays, the ability to move defenders and get the ball located where he wants it located. That's always been an important strength of Brett's ability, to throw the ball accurately. He does an excellent job with his eyes and things like that. They really utilize him in concepts that he has a decade full of reps in."

But to knock off Minnesota, the Packers must come close to equaling their domination of Adrian Peterson - 55 yards on 25 carries in the first meeting. But they also know they must do a much better job in getting to Brett Favre than in the 30-23 loss back on October 5th.

"Our defense needs to stop the run again," said McCarthy. "We have a lot of respect for both their running backs. They're both really good football players. It always starts with running the football with the Vikings. They got away from that in Pittsburgh with the high number of throws."

"After that, it goes to winning the one-on-one battles in pass protection and hitting the quarterback. Playing against their defense, it starts with them up front. They're definitely a different football team in the dome than they are on grass. We feel we need to win that battle up front again, because that's where the big time football games start."

Meanwhile, if Aaron Rodgers performs the way McCarthy believes he can, and the Packers win, Rodgers probably would earn a game ball, something he hasn't done all year long.

"I openly admit in some parts we're too hard on Aaron."

Much like the injury bug has been hard on the offensive line, a constant problem for the last few years for McCarthy.

'It's a thing that's been going on for a couple years. We've got a number of guys that are now coming back and getting healthy. The ability to have the same five players practice together for a couple weeks in a row is something we haven't been able to accomplish. We're still working our way through it."