While many people across the nation were awaking to a self-inflicted, post-Australia Day haze last Friday, Swans players awoke fresh and fighting fit, ready for their first competitive hit-out of the year.

At that point, there were exactly four weeks to go until the Swans NAB Cup opener, and all players were advised to bring their mouthguards for the closest experience of game simulation so far this pre-season.

Coach John Longmire pin-pointed the session as the beginning of a shift from conditioning training to competitive work.

From now on, the Swans will continue to focus on competitive training, building up to an intra-club match on February 17, a week out from facing St Kilda and Geelong at Etihad Stadium.

“We’ll increase the competitive element of training, which the players are probably looking forward to now, and continue to work on some of the areas we need to improve upon,” Longmire told SwansTV.

“We’re still working on our skills, we’ve been doing work on that, but we need to continue doing that under real pressure now.”

As has been reported on sydneyswans.com.au throughout the last few months, trying to improve the players’ skills and goalkicking have been two of the major focuses since pre-season began in early November.

Now, according to Longmire, is the period when they find out if in-roads have been made. 

“We are trying to work on (our skills), we are spending a lot of time on it, but we never really know until we get into match conditions,” he said.

“(With goalkicking) it’s a combination of making sure the players who have the most amount of shots continue to have the most amount of shots during pre-season, practice under fatigue - which is critical - and make sure they get the basis of their run-up right, in particular the set shots.

“But also it’s just a matter of doing it time and time again, and that’s the best way of practicing.”

With an exciting crop of talent coming through the ranks at the Swans, Longmire highlighted the work the older group of players have done in setting the example for the youngsters during the tough summer months.

It’s hard to think of better role-models for the likes of Jordan Lockyer and Harry Cunningham, who are just entering the AFL system, to learn the professionalism of the game off than premiership players such as Adam Goodes, Jude Bolton and Ryan O’Keefe. 

“Some of the older, veteran-type players are still putting together a good pre-season,” Longmire said.

“They know how to prepare and that’s why they’ve played so much football.

“We’re starting to see a few of those younger kids come on and start to do some really good things and hopefully give us some more depth as we head into the season.

“These players are learning a lot. They’re learning off the senior players, and hopefully learning off the coaches as well, and hopefully that holds them in good stead going into the first series of NAB Cup games.”