Essendon senior coach Ben Rutten spoke to the media at Optus Stadium on Thursday morning ahead of the Bombers' clash with the Eagles at Optus Stadium on Saturday night.

Here are the five key takeaways from his media conference.

1. Main session at Optus

It’s unusual to see the mighty Bombers enjoying a main training session on Perth’s premier ground, but that’s exactly what Ben Rutten’s side did on Thursday morning.

With the side being rushed out of Melbourne, the Dons completed a session which was originally slated for the NEC Hangar.

Rutten said the opportunity to train at Optus Stadium didn’t faze his playing group.

“Yeah, it’s an opportunity we haven’t done in the past,” Rutten said.

“To get our main training done here, we’ve basically just shifted our program in the last couple of days and moved it up here.”

2. Away from home a non-issue

Rutten wouldn’t be drawn into the issue of whether potentially being away from home longer than Saturday’s game will affect his side.

The senior coach pointed out his playing group would be ready for anything after dealing with hub life in 2020.

“We did it a fair bit last year,” he said.

“Going into this year we knew there was going to be some times where there was potential this might happen, but the guys are pretty flexible in taking it in their stride.”

3. No time for speculation

A hot topic of Thursday’s media conference was whether Essendon was preparing for round 12’s Dreamtime game with Richmond to be potentially played somewhere else as Melbourne enters a snap lockdown.

Rutten said his main focus was solely on tackling the Eagles, and the Bombers wouldn’t finalise preparations for following games until there were concrete plans.

“It’s not the top of my priority list at the moment,” he said.

“We’re going to focus on what we’ve got playing West Coast. We can speculate all we like, but we’ve got people taking care of that.”

4. Bombers being at their best

The Dons are preparing to play one of the toughest away trips in the AFL when they take on West Coast at Optus Stadium.

The Eagles have won all five games at their home ground this year and have only lost seven matches from 40 games in their history at the venue.

Rutten knows his young brigade will have to be on from the get-go if they’re a chance at winning the contest.

“They’re obviously a really good team,” Rutten said.

“They lost last week but we know what they’re capable of over here.

“We’re preparing for them to be at their best and we know we’re going to have to be at our best to be able to compete with them.”

5. Backline set for litmus test

The Bombers’ young defensive unit will come up against a premier forward line on Saturday night.

West Coast’s formidable attack boasts four premiership players in Josh Kennedy, Jack Darling, Liam Ryan and Jamie Cripps, while youngsters Oscar Allen and Jack Petruccelle round out a threatening offensive unit.  

With the Dons’ backline only having played 10 games together, Rutten is excited by the challenge his young defenders are set to face against the Eagles.

“We’ve been really encouraged by their growth and building their chemistry and understanding how each other plays and keeping evolving their individual game and also as a backline unit,” he said.

“We understand West Coast have got some threats aerially but also at ground level as well. It’ll be a good opportunity for them to build their game together.”