“I think a lot of our young players really stepped up yesterday, they had some really good games, and when they’re stepping up it takes the workload off a lot of the senior players,” he said.

“We’ve been playing some pretty good footy, I think, over the last month, but we’ve been unable to get over the line. It was a tough win yesterday… hopefully it will bring a bit of confidence, especially for a lot of our younger guys.”

The Swans face a tough path to the finals, with matches against ladder leaders St Kilda and Geelong, and finals contenders Brisbane Lions and Carlton still to come.

“I think we’re still a big chance [for the finals]… It’s going to be tough, I’m going to have to make sure we keep winning, but we’ve got the confidence and we’ve got that belief that we’re going to make it,” O’Keefe said.

O’Keefe said the team were looking forward to their remaining home matches at the SCG “fortress”, including this weekend’s clash against a youthful Essendon side.

“We’re undefeated here this year, and you always want to make your home ground a bit of a fortress, so hopefully we can keep that up.

“[Essendon] have got a higher running, high possession game, but hopefully here we can play it on our terms, shut them down a bit and hopefully that’ll be a big advantage for us.

“Yesterday was a real crucial game for us so we had to make sure we won otherwise the season was over, so we really had a big focus going into yesterday’s game and it’s going to be the same for the next month of footy.”