Sydney midfielder Daniel Hannebery says he and his fellow midfielders will be keen to atone for being 'obliterated' by St Kilda's on-ball division last time they met when the two teams renew acquaintances on Sunday at the SCG.
Maintaining top spot on the ladder would ordinarily serve as enough motivation for Sydney to beat the Saints this week, but Hannebery says righting the wrongs of that disastrous Saturday evening in May at Etihad Stadium would also be at the forefront of the Swans midfielders' minds.
After skipping out to a 15-point lead in the first quarter, Sydney conceded 13 of the next 17 goals of the Round 9 encounter to trail St Kilda by 50 points close to three-quarter time before eventually losing by 28 - their last loss of the season.
"We got smashed, especially in the second and third quarters, we got absolutely obliterated in the midfield and around the ground," Hannebery said on Wednesday.
"They're going to be pretty confident coming up here and matching us, they did it last time so we've got a massive task on our hands this week.
"They're a super outfit, they smacked us a couple of weeks ago ... we've got to make sure we're on our game and if we're a bit off, they're a good enough team to really make us pay and they made us pay last time in Melbourne.
"(There's) no reason why we can't win this week but we've got to be 100 percent."
The Swans have won six on the trot since that loss to St Kilda to be the form team of the competition and Hannebery said they were 'hungry' to show the Saints why their midfield had been held in such high regard in recent weeks.
"We've improved since then as a side but I think this week is a good test (to see) how far we have improved against the St Kilda midfield because they did beat us last time in Melbourne. I think the guys are pretty hungry to get back on top of them," he said.
"We're working well together, we all know our strengths and weaknesses pretty well now and we've got areas we need to work on still but we think we're working well as a group and we're really supporting each other out there and we've just got to make sure we remain unselfish and keep working with each other and so far it's worked for us."
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