Round 2 WAFL Preview v East Perth

Swan Districts made a blistering start to the WAFL season at home last Saturday and now hit the road this week looking to knock off East Perth to keep the momentum rolling.

Given how costly the narrow losses at the start of last season proved to be, getting off to a fast beginning to the 2024 season has been the focus of Swan Districts.

That started well last Saturday with the 64-point win at Steel Blue Oval against the West Coast Eagles, but now it's a significantly bigger test to come this Saturday afternoon.

Swans travel to Leederville's Sullivans Logistics Stadium to take on a Royals team coming off making the finals in 2023, and then starting their own 2024 season in winning fashion beating South Fremantle last Saturday afternoon by 39 points.

That sets up a tantalising Round 2 match up for Saturday afternoon with the league game to get underway at 2.30pm.

The Reserves and Colts from Swan Districts will be in action for the first time this season as well after having the opening round bye. The Colts game gets underway at 9.15am and then the Reserves contest at 11.45am.

A 2-0 start to the season would be the ideal way for Swan Districts to get off to the opposite beginning to that of 2023 and that chance presents against East Perth on Saturday, but it will be anything but easy.

East Perth did win both meetings between the two teams in 2024 with the first of those seeing the Royals overrun Swans in Round 1 also at Leederville to win by a point.

They then backed it up with a 48-point win in Round 13 at Steel Blue Oval on the way to making a return to the finals.

There is just one change for Swan Districts to the team that beat West Coast last week and it's to the defensive unit. Co-captain Brandon Erceg comes into the team at the expense of Luke Taylor.

Meanwhile, East Perth has made three changes to the team that beat South Fremantle with the inclusions of Hamish Brayshaw, Nick Robertson and Stan Wright.

Lewis Tester was part of that win for Swan Districts last week against the Eagles in the second League appearance of his career, and now he's hoping the black-and-whites can keep the momentum going on Saturday against the Royals.

"It was a great feeling playing in front of such a good crowd it really helped lift the energy for us out there on the ground and to get a convincing win like that and run away with it in the last quarter really topped the day off and gave me real excitement about what we can do this year," Tester said.

"It will be a great challenge this weekend to see where we are at as a team. I think East Perth are up there as one of the teams that are considered to go deep into finals this year so it’s going to be a great test.

"I know we have the believe and we are strong enough to beat them so we will go out there and give it everything and bring home a win to show the comp where we are at and that we are in for a big year this year."