Sydney Swans coach John Longmire addressed the media at the SCG on Monday afternoon. 

Sydney is set for a massive clash with Geelong at the SCG on Thursday night.

Here are some key quotes from the press conference. 

How Isaac Heeney is tracking after his concussion in the Richmond game
“He’s okay. We’ll see how the next couple of days pan out to make a decision on whether he plays or not. He’s in line to not do a whole lot of training tomorrow so you’d have to at this stage say he’s in doubt. But we’ll make that call later in the week. He did a test at half-time and cleared the test. But what can happen is you have delayed symptoms and that’s what happened. It was a little bit delayed in the third quarter and he didn’t feel quite right so he came off the ground and didn’t go back on. He’s not back to 100 per cent so that’s why he’s in a little bit of doubt at this stage.” 

Tom Papley’s fitness
“Tom Papley won’t play this week. We’re hoping to have him okay for the North Melbourne game. He’s not quite right just yet. He won’t be doing a lot of training this week. We want to take the opportunity to get him absolutely right. We just feel as though if we played him now he’d be at risk of re-tearing his hip flexor, which is not what we want. So we want to give him the time to and allow him the time to do that.” 

The returns of Sam Reid and Lewis Melican from injury
“Five minutes into the NEAFL game we thought he might play this week against the Cats. We sat down last week and mapped out a plan for both Sam and Lewis Melican with our medical staff. But that plan went out the window. Sam and Lewis won’t play in the seniors this week but they’ll up their game time in the NEAFL. We were thrilled they were able to get through our NEAFL game on the weekend. They both played pretty well but it was essentially a light session compared to a big test we face this week against the Cats at the SCG. We didn’t want to take that risk even though they both went okay and pulled up well. We’ll make a decision next week on their North Melbourne availability. After the NEAFL game this week we don’t want to pre-empt anything just yet. We don’t have all the facts in place. The good thing is they both got through the game, they both went well and they both pulled up really well. I don’t tend to worry about that too much because there are always things that bob up and a fair bit of water to go under the bridge between now and that game. I’ll concern myself with the Cats this week and the players that can help us with that and obviously the medical and conditioning staff will look after the preparation for both Lewis and Sam.” 

Thursday game
“Those bruising games take a toll on both teams. You don’t get a lot of early training done as to numbers on the training track. We’re confident that by tomorrow we’ll be okay with the majority of players to be able to play against the Cats on Thursday. That’s what the game is these days – you’ve got to spend a lot of time on recovery and getting yourself right. It was a tough game against the Tigers and we expect another tough game against the Cats. Both teams need to bounce back and we expect it to be really fierce.”

Reflections on the Richmond game
“We just felt that Richmond were super. They’re playing at the top of their game at the moment. They probably think they can get better and internally they’d have their own views on that. But from coming out of the game and looking at how they played they are absolutely on the top of their game. They’re playing really hard, strong footy. At the 10-minute mark of the last quarter we were four points down but we needed to make sure we had straight kicking to be in that position. They were very good and they were very consistent during the course of the game as far as having 22 contributors. We fell a little bit short in that regard, so we’ll need to be a bit more even in our contribution.” 

Facing a tough Geelong outfit
“Both teams are in the same boat in regards to bouncing back and we are going to be doing everything in our power to do that. We know those games against Geelong are ripping games of footy most of the time and we expect this week to be no different. They’ve got absolute superstars running around their midfield. Any midfield that has Dangerfield, Ablett and Selwood, Hawkins up front and James Kelly and some of the younger players they’ve introduced.  Their defence has been super all year, they’ve got a really tough team and we expect a really tough challenge.” 

Will George Hewett tag?
“We expect all of our midfielders to be accountable when the opposition have got the ball. George will have a challenge this week as he has most weeks and so far he’s been responding to those challenges really well and this week he’ll have another one.” 

Geelong’s star midfield
“They can be very efficient when they do get the ball. Those players can win the ball and when they do they can be very damaging and get the ball in the front half. So they can be an absolute threat. But one of their strengths this year has been their defence. Their defence has been super.”