Essendon VFL will focus on keeping the game on their terms when they face North Ballarat on Sunday at Eureka Stadium.
The Bombers are sitting just outside the top eight, in ninth place, after five wins and six losses.
“We’ve been working hard on our setting up and being more diligent keeping the ball in our forward half – that will be a focus for us on Sunday,” Performance Coach Dan Jordan said.
“They’re a competitive side, they always give their all around the contest and can win ball and contests if you allow them to.”
“No matter who the opposition is we want to play the way that we want to play. Play the game in our forward half, win the contested ball and hopefully that should translate to scoreboard results.”
The Dons defeated second placed Williamstown in round 10, prior to being beaten by Richmond last weekend.
“We seem to be in a bit of a phase at the moment where we are having a good win followed by a loss,” Jordan said.
“We are really keen to bounce back, and it’s more about playing the way that we want to play.”
The round 12 match will take place at North Ballarat’s home ground, Eureka Stadium, and Jordan says the Dons are ready for the trip up the highway.
“They are probably one of those VFL sides that do definitely play better at home than they do away.”
“It’s also a bit of the mindset with the trip going up to Ballarat. For players it’s about making sure their mindset is focused on getting the job done – it doesn’t matter where we play.”
“When you play VFL or AFL level you need to be executing your game plan no matter what the conditions and where you’re playing.”
Essendon has named an extended squad of 27 players with the final team to be decided on Sunday morning.
“AFL had a six day break and we are playing on Sunday so at the moment it’s a squad – relative to what happens in AFL level on Saturday,” Jordan said.
“There might be some late changes with the AFL going into a six day break. We won’t know our full selected side until after the AFL play.”
“There’s a couple (players) that have gone up to AFL and a couple that have come back, and James Ferry comes back to VFL level.”
“We have a pretty strong side, certainly that might change before Sunday.”
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