Harper Sercombe chatted with Amelia Radford from Essendon to hear her thoughts on the pre-season and what to expect from the Bombers in season 8 of the AFLW.

After finishing 10th in their first season in the AFLW, Essendon is seeking to take the next step in season 8.

Bomber’s VFLW premiership player and inaugural member of the AFLW side Amelia Radford said they are counting down the days to their round one clash with Hawthorn.

“Last year’s round one game against Hawthorn was amazing and I think it was a night that we’ll all remember… we’re all equally excited, and we definitely want to get the win again to continue the tradition,” she said.

To get to opening night of the season is a long road for many of the players including Radford, who put in a lot of hard work playing with Essendon’s VFLW side preparing themselves for the AFLW.

“Most of us have been training since early in the year, around March in the VFL program and had a week or two to reset and recover, then straight into the AFL preseason which started about three months ago now,” she said.

The pre-season for the Bombers has been about developing relationships and connections that will hopefully take the group to where they want to be. With a trip west to face the Eagles over the weekend, Radford said the timing was perfect.

“Continuing to build our culture and set really high standards so we can have a successful program,” she said.

“I think getting away as a team is always a good opportunity to do that, to spend some time with more players and different players away from the club setting.

“It’s a really good opportunity for us to play our brand of footy and build on what we’ve been building on in the off-season.”

In the off-season the Bombers brought in six players to fill some holes within their list, including adding some much needed experience. Brooke Walker, Brooke Brown, Kodi Jacques, Georgia Nanscawen, Matilda Dyke, Leah Cutting were added to the list.

“A lot of them are primarily defenders to build and bolster our back line a bit more,” Radford said.

“They’ve all been settling in really well. We’ve all got to get to know them a lot better, they’re amazing footballers and they bring a lot to the football program.

“It’s nice to have some refreshing faces in our program and they continue to drive really high standards which is good.”

Although, there has been one player who has caught Radford’s eye, much to the delight of Bombers supporters.

“Maddy Presprakis is already at that next level but what she’s done in the off-season, for herself to work on the areas that she wanted to work on, specifically around her fitness and her leadership,” she said.

“She’s an amazing leader in the off season for a lot of us girls that were playing VFL, coming to all our games, helping us with training and providing us feedback.

“She’s continued that into the AFL program and is a real leader of the group now which is awesome to see.”

Prespakis and Radford will be keys to unlock what the Bombers are setting out to achieve this season with finals aspirations on the agenda.

“We just want to compete with the best, and compete every week and have a consistent performance,” Radford said.

“The goal of finals, et cetera, will hopefully take care of itself and be reflected in our hard work.

“We know that we need to continually improve to get there but that’s our ultimate goal.”

The Bombers are back at their spiritual home of Windy Hill for the upcoming season. After being largely on the road for season 7, it’s a welcomed change.

“It’s very exciting, we want to build it as our fortress as our home ground,” Radford said.

“We played a few games there over the last few weeks, we’re going to be doing some training there as well.

“I think it’s going to be good for all the fans to get down and watch us at Windy Hill and to have that home fortress and hopefully we can win all our home games.”

Radford has been a proven ball winner at the VFLW level, having averaged more than 21 disposals in the competition, including a patch of three games where she was averaging 29 touches, showing off her cleanliness at ground level and aerial abilities.

Although in the AFLW she wasn’t able to have the same form from her seven games, something that she said is a focus of hers.

“I had a handful of games in the inside midfield and was able to get my hands on it a lot which was great for my own belief and my own confidence,” she said.

“In the AFL, I think it’ll be a combination of playing inside where I can win the contest and get it out to the players around me.But also on the wing, working on my running capacity, running both ways and getting the ball a bit more in space and not getting contested possessions the whole time.”

With the women’s season starting in the bye between the men’s home and away season and finals series, a date against Hawthorn awaits on Saturday, September 2 under lights at Kinetic Stadium.

Other than the season opener there was one game that Radford was particularly looking forward to.

“We play Collingwood on grand final day at the AIA Centre, at 11am, if Collingwood’s men’s team are in the grand final and we’re playing down in that precinct early in the morning. I think that would be a pretty special day,” she said.