FREMANTLE will use the pre-finals bye to build star midfielder Hayden Young's fitness with the aim of increasing his game time in a cutthroat elimination final at Optus Stadium next week.
Young has played eight games this season due largely to repeat hamstring injuries, and he returned from a groin setback against the Western Bulldogs last Sunday to play a crucial midfield role.
The 24-year-old played approximately 80 minutes in managed game time and pulled up well this week, training lightly on Wednesday before a big session later in the week that the Dockers hope will get him ready to take another step up in September.
"The medicos and fitness guys handled his game time really well … and I thought he had a big impact on the game," coach Justin Longmuir said on Wednesday.
"He's been disappointed when he's had those repeat injuries, but he just got back to work and worked his backside off. That allows him to come in and have a big game against a really good midfield.
"It's a bit of a build for him, and that's probably the bonus of the two weeks. It benefits some, and Youngy is one of those.
"He'll do a big session on Friday, which will set him up for a good week next week."
The Dockers are waiting on the result of Wednesday night's clash between Gold Coast and Essendon before they know if the Suns or Hawthorn will be their elimination final opponent next week.
Longmuir said the Dockers had no preference for their finals match-up, putting the focus on their own football this week before moving into a standard preparation.
"We'll just watch it normally at home, we're not barracking for anyone. If it's Gold Coast, it's Gold Coast. If it's Hawthorn, it's Hawthorn," he said.
"This week is about getting our footy better, working on a few things we need to work on in our game and then whoever we play, we'll focus on next week because it doesn't really matter right now."
Fremantle will enter its first finals series since 2022 with 17 players on its list who featured in that year's elimination final against the Bulldogs and semi-final against Collingwood, with 12 of those in action last week.
Longmuir said there had been a lot of change, particularly in the forward line, with Shai Bolton, Pat Voss, Murphy Reid and Luke Jackson all joining the team since, and Josh Treacy emerging after missing those finals.
"To be honest, it feels like we're a really different team, so we focus probably on this year and the growth this year, rather than looking back that far," he said.
"What we've been able to do is build a style of footy that is able to be adaptive to the opposition we play against and game situations.
"We've lost clearances at times this year but we've been able to rely on our ball movement. We've won clearance and been able to lock the ball in and play a front-half game.
"Our backline has been strong all year and been able to hold up under pressure at times, especially against the better sides as we saw on the weekend.
"So I feel like we're building a style of footy that is flexible and adaptable."
Longmuir said he would prefer the finals bye to be shifted to the week before the Grand Final, but it suited the Dockers' circumstances this week with Young's build-up and a knee knock for important forward Sam Switkowski.
He said the high-pressure nature of last week's build-up to the Bulldogs clash, which was a virtual elimination game, should hold his team in good stead going into a finals campaign.
"I don't think the final will be built up as much as that game, so in some sense the pressure will be less," he said.
"We've had a couple of weeks we would love back in terms of the product we've put out on weekends, but we were able to reset and focus on us a fair bit last week.
"We felt like if we took our best footy on the road against the Dogs we would get the job done.
"I was really proud of the players to be able to control what we could control and then I think that showed in the execution."
