On the return from the bye week:

“I think we’re doing enough right together to win the games that we have.

“There’s just so much room for improvement for our players as individuals on their journey.

“Whether you think about our experienced guys or the lads who are just scratching the surface in their careers.

“It’s a very different team, but we’re not a high-scoring side at the moment, so it’s an opportunity for us to show our wares and score a bit more.

“We’re defending a bit too much. Against St Kilda, we gave them the footy back in their own front third way too often.

“We’ve been doing that a lot this year.

“There are all these areas we can improve, so it’s fantastic that we’ve been able to win enough games to at least be in the mix. There’s some encouragement there.

“We’re aiming to be a better team again now.”

On lessons from the last game against the Swans:

“As the game wore on, I think at the time we had Lachie Smith and Louis Emmett playing in the ruck, among some other aspects. The team that we pick this week will be nine or ten players different to the last time we played Sydney.

“They’ll have five or six different as well. Both teams are a bit different.

“They present a real challenge because of their run-and-gun, attacking flair and their ability to score.

“Last time we played, Charlie Curnow got way too much open-field supply, so we’ve got to do something about that — not leave our key defenders out to dry.

“It’ll be a great way to start some momentum in the back third of the year.”

On recent form at the SCG:

“This year, we’ve won interstate.

“We’ve won two in Adelaide and one in Brisbane. The boys enjoy getting away and love the harbour city. I think it’s an exciting couple of days to go up there, play on that ground and take on the Swans.

“We definitely haven’t cracked the code yet, but we’re looking forward to going up and playing at the SCG against the Swans.”

On Marcus Bontempelli and injuries after the bye:

“He evolved into a state where he was better, and the knee was a lot better than it was. It was hindering him; the foot was the thing I was most nervous about - when you’ve got an impact-type injury in your foot, that can get worse.

“It seems as though he’ll come out of this period feeling pretty healthy and strong.

“He and Ed, working through that ankle injury, and Aaron working through his issues - they’ve been brilliant just fronting up, putting up with discomfort and showing great leadership.

“Hopefully they’re feeling fresh coming into this one.”

On improving the Dogs’ ability to score:

“There are a couple of things attached to it.

“Getting back to individuals just being cleaner, making better decisions and executing in finding each other when they have those opportunities - it’s pretty simple.

“They’re still going to exist. There is some adventure in our offence; we don’t play a static game. We like to put some speed on the ball when we can and play an electrifying brand if we’re up for it.

“We haven’t had the brilliance - the finish hasn’t been there.

“I think because we turn the ball over so blatantly sometimes, when we shouldn’t, a lot of those examples look like they’re going to be really good scoring opportunities for us.

“If we just tidy ourselves up when there’s not a lot of direct pressure on us, we might kick an extra three or four a game, and that will make a huge difference.”

On Cody Weightman:

“He’s going well.

“He’s had those elbow injuries - he’s just such a courageous player.

“He got it jammed with a hyperextension.

“We learned from the last one that he wasn’t quite right previously. He toughed his way through a couple of games but, by the third or fourth game, he was feeling a bit better, although he ended up needing surgery on that elbow.

“This one is nowhere near as bad, but it’s settled. He’ll play - he should be fine.”

On Tom Liberatore’s future:

“He’s not preparing for a ‘final assault’.

“One game under his belt and we kind of managed his minutes.

“He’ll probably keep playing that sort of exposure, I’d say - around that 70–75% game time.

“I think in his mind, he feels as though he’d like to play beyond this year, and this next series of games will help with how he’s thinking about his future.”

On the potential fixture for 2027 and the future:

“Without being too prescriptive, I think if we can at least allow people to play each other once before things change.

“We’ve got to turn it into a bit more of an equitable draw.

“Even when you think about history into the future, history doesn’t repeat.

“So current fixtures based on history, where the top teams aren’t playing the bottom teams as much — those sort of connotations don’t work, because no one can predict the future.

“The way that you settle it is to give everyone an even chance — everyone plays each other once. The next year, you do it all again, but you play at the alternate venue.

“Ideally, it finishes and you go into a finals series - I know that’s not going to work, I know they’re going to be after more games.

“I think another 18-game season, with Tasmania coming in, would be enough.”

On learnings from the last month of football:

“The good thing since then is that we’ve been able to beat Hawthorn, which gives us some encouragement.

“It was more around these things that we need to improve on.

“Our contest was OK, our pressure game was not where it needs to be, and that’s about applying it and dealing with it.

“There are simple things that we can go after. We’re really looking forward to every game.

“We play Fremantle, we play Sydney - we haven’t played the Gold Coast Suns yet, who are obviously going through a challenging patch.

“Obviously, we haven’t played a number of teams who are sort of below us as well.

“There are some great opportunities for us to test ourselves against these things that we’re trying to work on.”

On motivating the team through July:

“You get caught up in your own storylines.

“We put some things in place over the pre-season, including during our camp - a bit of a week-to-week approach to reward and recognition.

“So we leverage off that.

“We talked about some things today around our identity and the opportunity to forge that even further.

“You can take an angle or two and generate some excitement.

“Ryley Sanders plays his 50th game this week, which is a great achievement for Sando. Joel (Freijah) was a few weeks ago, so those two boys have reached those milestones really quickly.

“We definitely go after some emotional aspects. As I said at the start of the press conference, there is something right — there’s a systematic glue that exists within the team at the moment which is helping us win enough games.

“We’re going to need more than that to be one of the better teams, but it’s a good place to be, where there is a little bit of trust with each other.

“The team chemistry is bubbling away; now we want it to overflow.”

On the proposed training restrictions to mitigate concussions:

“No one wants to dance around the seriousness of concussion.

“I don’t think you’ll ever be able to eliminate the risk, but mitigating it is important.

“I think every team, every club has their own instructions.

“We go about our training drills in a certain way to do our best to mitigate the circumstances where you lose someone to a head knock in training.

“You do need to train it because players need to familiarise themselves with it — they need to rehearse it.

“We play match practice pretty early in the pre-season. I’ve had a look at some of the categories and I wouldn’t imagine we need to change too much.

“I think we should be OK.”