In the return of the Game Plan, Swans midfield coach, Leigh Tudor, talks about the Swans build-up to tonight's historic Sydney Derby...

The most important thing for any team preparing for a football match is to know their opposition inside out. Of course, for the Swans this weekend, that task has been made a little more difficult given GWS are an unknown entity in the AFL competition.

Fortunately, thanks to the NAB Cup, we’ve been pretty lucky and have been able to see the Giants play three or four times so far this year, and have done plenty of opposition scouting in that time. We believe we have done as much work as we could to research and understand GWS ahead of round one, and we are treating it just like any AFL football game. The last thing we want is to get tricked first up by a new team, so we are ready for anything they might throw at us.

Looking at their side and what they’ve done with the midfield group, it seems they like to put all of their stronger players around the ball. It is for this reason that I think it’s going to be a fairly tight tussle inside.

From the vision we’ve been able to review, there is no doubt that have been quite strong in the centre bounces in the last three or four matches they have played. They have a talented young ruckman in Jonathan Giles who has been impressive in the preseason as well as co-captain Callan Ward, who is known as a really strong and classy midfielder.

We know we need to be really hard and really tough in this match and that we have to do it for four quarters because like I mentioned, GWS have already proven they are a good centre bounce and stoppage team.

I think playing a strong defensive game is also very important for this match. We know GWS are a team that will surge forward, for that reason we need to make sure that our defensive unit are on their game, we need to get our hands on the ball and get the first use of the ball, and be really hard and tough in the midfield.

While we’ve had to dedicate a lot of time getting to know the Giants, we’ve also been working really hard on perfecting our own structures and concentrating on the areas where we know we can get on top of our opponents.  We’ve had a lot of really impressive play from many of our own players over the pre-season, all of whom are more than ready to step up for the challenge this weekend.

One player who has really stood out over the last few months is Luke Parker. Luke showed enough last year, playing 13 games, but probably played more up forward. This year, he has been someone who has come back and has made a really big statement from the first training session back in the pre-season to the last game, and when somebody makes such a strong statement, you just have to give them a chance. Luke has really deserved his opportunity to play in the midfield and the way he’s been going, we expect him to be really hard and tough like he has been so far this pre-season.

We need to make sure that we let GWS know from the first bounce to the last bounce that they’re in for a tough game. If we can do that for four quarters then I think we’ll be in for a great game.