SYDNEY Swans coach John Longmire has praised his players' resilience for holding off a charging North Melbourne in the dying stages of Saturday's one-point win at Etihad Stadium but has admitted they still have plenty to work on.

The Swans held a four-point lead at three-quarter time but gave that up at the 17-minute mark of the final quarter when Drew Petrie kicked his third goal.

They wrenched it back five minutes later but the majority of red time was played in the Roos' attacking 50m arc with the Swans forced to defend ferociously with the margin under a goal.

"There were a couple of good efforts that helped us get over the line," Longmire said afterwards.

"Sometimes you just have to dig in - they had a lot of inside 50s in the last quarter, they might have had 18 or something like that, and I thought defensively we withstood that pressure pretty well.

"That was a really pleasing sign."

However, he was disappointed the Swans lost in three key areas - the contested ball, the clearances and inside 50s - and said his side must become more consistent over four quarters.

The win was the Swans' fourth with a margin under three goals, and Longmire admitted the close ones could prove to be significant in three months' time.
  
"There's been a couple ... there is a whole pack of teams in the middle rungs of the ladder and sometimes you need to win some of those close ones," he said.

Lewis Jetta was deployed as the Swans' substitute player for the start of the fourth quarter and came on to have the desired effect when he played a hand in three forward thrusts and laid a strong tackle on Michael Firrito that influenced a fourth.

Longmire admitted he had considered dropping the 22-year-old for the clash with the Roos after a slow few weeks.
 
"We talked about what's best for Lewis. Last year we put him back to the reserves and he got a bit of confidence up," he said.

"We discussed what to do with him this week because he's a really exciting player, we want him confident and back in our team.

"But we thought the sub option for us ... this week, on a pretty quick deck, coming on in the last quarter, hopefully he could do something.

"He was pretty good in that last quarter, he gave us a lot of run when both teams, their players were pretty out on their feet.

"He did what we wanted him to do and he gave us that real lift off the bench."

Longmire praised the performances of Tadhg Kennelly, who was firm in defence in the hot final term, Heath Grundy - who took over the role on Petrie and kept him quiet for three quarters - and Craig Bird on Andrew Swallow.

He said Jetta was given the all clear after appearing to injure his knee in his tackle on Firrito and should be fine for next week's clash with the Brisbane Lions.

He also said he was hopeful but not confident Shane Mumford and Kieren Jack would be available for the match at the Gabba.