FOLLOWING an off-season turnover of 14 players between Seasons 6 and 7 of the AFL Women’s, West Coast skipper Emma Swanson is relieved about the list continuity heading into Season 8 and believes her side is good enough to play finals.

“It’s been a really positive preseason for us,” Swanson said. “We had a real good continuity in our list coming from last year where we turned over 14 players. Coming through this preseason we obviously added and that was our only new face in group which is fantastic.

“It eliminates all those teething inductions feels in the first couple of weeks. We’ve been able to get straight into work and I think the girls are looking good.”

The short turnaround between seasons made it tricky for a side like West Coast, with the young Eagles having to play an abundance of matches within a calendar year. Now with the longer off-season, Swanson believes the time off will have provided the younger players with an ability to grow as players.

“The ability to go away from football for a little bit and just focus on themselves, focus on their fitness, focus on their strength,” Swanson said. “All these other things they maybe haven’t had time to do in the past with WAFL seasons and Under 18s seasons and all those kind of things.

“For them to go away and miss footy a little bit really helps coming now to preseason, long preseason but to keep the energy up the whole way through.”

West Coast managed just two wins for Season 7 and finished 16th on the ladder, only above two expansion sides in Port Adelaide and Sydney. Despite it being a challenging year – also conceding the second most points in the competition – Swanson said it was the younger players who kept her motivated rather than the other way around.

“They’re a room full of jellybeans if you come in from work, it’s fantastic to come into such an energised group,” she said. “The thing with young players is their consistency is up and down so that’s one thing that we’re trying to work on its just the ability to show up and dish out good performances no matter how you’re feeling and I’m sure that will all come for us and when it clicks then I’m sure it’s going to click an avalanche.”

West Coast has no shortage of young stars coming through the pathway, and Swanson said at the AFL Women’s Captain’s Day there was one name she brought up more than anyone.

“I’ve spent my whole morning talking about Ella Roberts and that’s an obvious one,” Swanson said. “She’s a very special footballer and I don’t think that this competition has seen anyone like her. When she fully hits her straps, she’s going to be pretty bloody special. We have a whole team if I’m really honest.”

However, Roberts was not the only one, with another couple of former AFLW Academy members set for huge seasons in the blue and gold.

“Courtney Rowley spent her off-season in the weights room and put on about six kilos of muscles and came back and just showed us how good she is at contested ball,” Swanson said. “She’s a natural in and under midfielder who has been forced to play a lot of her game on the outside due to her size and now she’s a lot stronger, she can handle it in the middle with some of the more mature bodies and I’m really excited to see what she can do.”

“The other one is Lauren Wakfer coming off an ACL. Last year didn’t get to play unfortunately but we drafted her anyway and I couldn’t be more thankful that the club did that and she just showed so much growth over the off-season, the way she has attacked her rehab is quite inspirational and I’m super, super proud of her. Just to have her out on the field, she is going some really special things for a kid who has just spent 12 months out of the game.”

Along with the youth, the Eagles will regain the services of experienced defender Evie Gooch after missing Season 7 through injury. Swanson said it was “really good” to have Gooch back out there, not just for her footballing ability, but her voice as well.

“She spent the last six months coaching with us throughout the last season so we’ve constantly heard her voice but to have her back out on the track is fantastic,” she said. “We do have a young backline so to have her maturity and experience down back is really good for us. Just above everything else, just her voice down there is really good.”

Knowing that Season 7 was a disappointing one for West Coast players, staff and fans, Swanson has no qualms in setting the bar high for her side. She believes the Eagles have the capacity to jump up into finals, while setting their sights on a premiership in the coming years.

“We want to play finals and we haven’t been quiet about that,” Swanson said. “We’ve spoken about it a lot internally and I think it comes off the back of scoring more and obviously you score more, you win more games.

“We’ve done a lot of work on our ball movement and contested ball. We’re hoping that it transfers across and we can get the wins on the board and put our hand up to play finals footy. The light is there at the end of the tunnel for us and we want to win a premiership in the next few years. The next step for us is to put our hand up and let the competition know that we’re here to play finals.”