The Sydney Swans have begun preparations ahead of Round 11 where they'll come face-to-face with the Western Bulldogs. Senior coach John Longmire appeared in a press conference on Tuesday and discussed updates to the squad amid the short week.
See what he had to say on the Swans midfield, Chad Warner and Luke Parker ahead of tribunal.
On the mood around the club
“We’ve got a belief in the way we’re playing. Our challenge is to keep that form up. It's to keep on striving for what we know the process has that's brought that to bear on game day. So, we go about our process during the week, trying to aim for improvement every week. We've been really pleased to have that consistency and we're still aiming to be as consistent as we can.”
On the Swans midfield
“People probably forget over the years there's been some reasonable midfield groups with blokes like Adam Goodes, Kieran Jack, Ryan O'Keefe, Josh Kennedy - those guys. But this is a different midfield, there's no question about that.
“The good thing about the evolution of the team over the last few years is we've started to rely more on our younger group coming through… They've been consistent in their performances, and we've been pleased with how they're developing.”
On Chad Warner
“He's always had it and we've seen a lot at training and his ability to be able to go from inside to outside in a short amount of time has been a real credit to him. He changes the way we play and so that's been important. He's been one of those guys in there that's contributed.”
“From the moment he came to the footy club when we drafted him, he was always one that could go from stop to almost top pace in a pretty short amount of time…The more he does it, the more confident he's becoming in his ability to be able to do it.
"It doesn't mean it's going to work every time and sometimes you've got to wear the good with the bad. But when he's able to do it and he's able to bring other players into the game the way that he does it, it certainly adds to our ability to be able to hit the scoreboard.”
On Brodie Grundy’s contribution to the team
“He gives a strong contest and he's got great experience and he gets after the ground level - another big body midfielder. We come up against the [Western Bulldogs] this week who have got an All-Australian Ruckman and players like Bontempelli and Treloar and Richards who have been in there doing really well. It'll be a big test this week against a pretty informed Bulldogs midfield.”
On Luke Parker
“He got injured in the pre-season and missed nine weeks out with a broken arm. It’s a tough period for Luke and unfortunately, we’ll have to wait and see what that means tonight. If you look at it, he went to block and he wasn't moving, he was actually stationary at the point of contact.
“He didn't go high, unfortunately it didn't work out the way that he probably intended it to do. He's not a player with any malice in him at all, he plays hard, tough football. The damage was done [by] back of Luke's head. We really feel for Josh and the Frankston players because it impacted them as well.
On Parker’s leadership
“We want to be playing senior football and I've been on the record at saying that. He's handled it so well. He's been terrific with our younger players, with our VFL program, our VFL coaches.
“He comments on it daily about how good he's been, and he's been really invested in our young players. He's been a leader of this footy club for a long time and as a leader he's taken that role to the next level and that needs to be acknowledged as well. He wants to play seniors, clearly, he wants to play senior footy and he'd be disappointed if he gets suspended tonight for a period of time.”
On Callum Mills’ return
“He'll be a few weeks after the bye. He did some running again yesterday and training again tomorrow. But we want to make sure he does a really good block. We backed him off a bit when he hurt his calf a few weeks ago. So now he needs to get some continuous training under his belt before we put him back in the team.”
On Tom McCartin
“Tommy won't be back this week. I think the Thursday night counts against him a little bit. If it was a weekend game, he might have been a better chance.
"He trained today and got through fine… The doctors obviously are taking a conservative approach to it. He's been pulling up well. He's been running and training. But as far as the competitive training that he needs to go to that next step, he probably hasn't done enough of it just at this point.
On Robbie Fox’s shoulder injury
“We were a bit concerned about him after the game. We thought it might have been a pretty serious AC joint. But he's actually pulled up a lot better than what we thought. So, he should be okay in a couple of weeks. We're hoping that after the bye, he's not far away from playing.”
On Angus Sheldrick playing more senior footy
“He's missed a bit of footy. He had a concussion a few weeks ago and then missed again. So, he's had a bit of stop-start type footy. He needs a bit of continuous football to get going. We don't think he's too far away. But he probably needs a bit more footy before we throw him in.”
