JAMES Hird concedes he is not sure how his players will cope during the next two weeks as the AFL Anti-Doping Tribunal plans to reveal its verdict on March 31.
The fate of 34 past and present Essendon players sits in the hands of the Tribunal, which will make public its decision just days before the Bombers' season-opening game against the Sydney Swans on April 4.
Speaking after the Bombers' 45-point loss to Greater Western Sydney on Friday night in the NAB Challenge, Hird said he expected the players to find it difficult to focus solely on the start of the season with the judgment nearing.
"There's no way they'll keep it off their minds. The players have been resilient, they've been fantastic, they've worked their backsides off, they've tried to give everything they have over the last two years, but I think we all know it's been in the shadows for a long time," the Essendon coach said.
"The fact that we're a bit over two weeks from getting a result, I don't think you can get it off your mind. It's their careers that they're looking at and they're very conscious that the decision's coming down soon.
"We won't be shying away from that, the players won't be shying away from that. We'll train our hardest and work our hardest to get ready for round one but there's no doubt the players will be very nervous coming up to the 31st of March."
Click here for full match coverage and stats
The club has signed 13 top-up players to help fill its team for the NAB Challenge series as 20 of its 2012-listed players sit out the pre-season competition to protect the anonymity of the 18 or so still at the club under provisional suspensions.
Although the depleted squad has lost comfortably to St Kilda and the Giants in the past two weeks, Hird said the club would continue to prepare for round one believing it will have its full list to chose from.
"We'll train hard up to round one, we'll work out our best team for round one," Hird said.
"We're predicting that the players will get off, obviously, so we'll prepare our team for round one as though they will get off and we'll have our best team available come our first game back in Sydney in early April."
Hird again found it difficult to know what to make of the club's outing against the Giants, which saw the Bombers well beaten through the midfield and trailing by 52 points at half-time.
"I thought our second half was better than our first half, there's no doubt about that. The players are having a go," Hird said.
For Giants coach Leon Cameron, it was a more encouraging night and one which will give the club's match committee plenty of discussion points this week.
WATCH: Leon Cameron's post-match press conference
The Giants will pick their best team for their final NAB Challenge game against the Sydney Swans on March 22, and are in a new but pleasing position of having many options to consider.
"A lot of players have put their hands up and we really look forward to picking that [team]," he said.
"It's a tough one, but we come up against the Swans and no doubt they'll have a fair dinkum crack."
The Giants took on the Bombers without key midfielders Ryan Griffen, Callan Ward, Will Hoskin-Elliott, Dylan Shiel and Josh Kelly, as well as defender Joel Patfull.
Jeremy Cameron was substituted out of the game at half-time after suffering some concussion from a heavy tackle he laid towards the main break.
Although it was rewarded with a free kick and Cameron went on to kick the long goal, he didn't return after half-time, and his coach said the star forward's aggressive approach meant the big hits would come occasionally.
"He's OK. He copped one to the head and the doctor said there was a little bit of an issue with concussion so we didn't take any risks with him," Cameron said.
"Sometimes he's his own worst enemy, he goes that hard in terms of his attack on the footy and attack on the player with the footy, and we've seen that tonight.
"We love the way he goes about it but sometimes you're going to have to put up with that."
