James Kelly can see the Bombers new look forward line providing more than just extra goal scoring prowess.

Essendon opened its JLT Community Series by booting 14.10.94 against Collingwood – a final score bettered only twice by the Dons during last year’s home and away season.

Small forwards Orazio Fantasia, Josh Green, Anthony McDonald-Tipungwuti and Travis Colyer combined for nine goals.

But Kelly says the group also bring important defensive pressure.

“The forward line is shaping up to be a real strength of ours, if we can give them some good supply and the big guys can bring the ball to ground, it’s going to be hard for opposition side’s to get the ball out of there,” Kelly told 3AW.

“That is maybe still a bit underrated – how important that [forward 50 pressure] is for your overall team defence, to be able to slow the ball out of your own forward line.

“Those guys have got good speed, they’re good pressure players and they’re also really polished as well – they’ve got good foot skills and they work really well together.”

The Dons have made several changes ahead of their second JLT Community Series match against Gold Coast on Sunday.

Kelly is among those left out as the coaching group moves to ensure each player is ready to go for round one.

Returning players Colyer, Jobe Watson, Michael Hurley and Ben Howlett have again been named alongside inclusions Heath Hocking and Brent Stanton.

Kelly said those that featured last week were impressive.

“They all looked really good… they played the way they’ve been training over the last few months,” he said.

“When they came back to training they were fit and had a lot of purpose.

“The game was reflective of that and we got what we wanted out of the game.”