The Bombers take on 12th placed Hawthorn on Friday night at the MCG in a must-win match for the team to stay in touch with the top four. Sheedy said one of the major challenges for the coaching panel at the moment is to keep the confidence high amongst the team. ""Sometimes when players haven't got a lot of confidence at a moment in a game or for a week or two, that can be changed around pretty readily. That is the part of coaching that myself and the coaching staff can pass onto the players. That is the part of developing a team that we want to have the next opportunity and chance for. We think we can produce players and make them harder. When you are playing with confidence, like two or three of the top-sides are at the moment it is a bonus. It is something we just have to keep working at and I don't mind that. The Western Bulldogs have turned it around, they have done very, very well,"" Sheedy said.

Q. Is the lack of hardness a main worry for you?
A. It is hard to measure hardness. It is pretty hard to replace a hardness of a Long or a Wallis, or perhaps a Damien Hardwick - but we can teach that into players. Dean Wallis never came in as hard as he ended up going out. Michael Long came in as a skinny little kid from the Northern Territory, who in the end could run, tackle and get outed in a Grand Final because he was a tougher person. Is it hardness or toughness of being more professional in a unit? When I first met Damien Hardwick he was working behind the Commonwealth counter as a bank teller - he was smiling at little old ladies and taking their money. Geez - have a look at him now, hasn't he changed! I think you can develop hardness and we have to do that.