Mature-aged recruit James Gwilt has flagged a ‘defence-first’ mentality from the Bombers’ back line ahead of their final NAB Challenge match on Friday against Melbourne.

The 28-year-old said defensive coach Matt Egan reinforced the message during the week as big-man opposition duo Chris Dawes and Jesse Hogan await Gwilt and his fellow defensive group.

“Ego just said the same as last week– it’s about controlling your man and beating them.”

“Because obviously Dawes and Hogan are pretty big boys, so we’ve got to stay in the contest and our body work has to be right, then we can go from there and get some footy into the attack with a bit of overlap run.

“But it’s about controlling them and controlling the contest then working off from there.”

Gwilt commended the way the group trained throughout the week ahead of the final training session tomorrow before Friday evening’s game at Etihad Stadium.

“We were out there today; we went through some set scenarios and the boys trained really well. We will prepare well this afternoon. We’ve got the Captain’s Run tomorrow and then be ready for Friday,” he said.

The former Saint will saddle up for his second practice game after making his debut in the red and black last week against GWS.

After a long pre-season campaign on the training track, Gwilt said he was relieved to get the first official practice match out of the way.

“Obviously good to get my first one under the belt for the club and I really enjoyed it,” Gwilt said.

“It was just good to get out there because we’ve been training for so long. To find a bit of the footy was good and as well as finally being able to play with the boys.”