HEATHMERE football has been through a rough few seasons, but nonetheless those in the know at the club say there’s plenty of reasons to be optimistic.

The club is currently neck-deep in their preseason training ahead of round one of the South West District Football League season in mid-April, with senior coach Adrian Hann saying the club has made great strides in the off-season.

“It’s been a really positive start to our preseason, we’ve had a lot of numbers at our training runs… and we’ve managed to retain almost our full list plus adding a number of senior players,” the second-year coach said.

“If anything, we were probably a bit early on getting into our training, but in saying that it’s been a good opportunity to start teaching some new stuff.”

The club made strong improvements during Hann’s first season as coach, managing to field both senior and reserves teams in all rounds, and posting their first senior victory since 2019 with a 100-point win over Westerns late in the season.

Developing an attacking playstyle has been one of Hann’s key objectives over the past month or so, as he wants to ensure his side can do their best to keep up the scoring tempo against the stronger teams in the competition.

“After speaking to some players in the group, a lot of them wanted to see us win some games,” Hann said.

“Obviously we can’t expect to leap straight to premiership contention, but there’s also no reason why we can’t be competitive week-in, week-out and hopefully win a few games.”

In addition, there is also an emphasis on the longer-term outlook of the club, with Hann hoping that the work being done now can help set it up for longer-term growth and success.

“Honestly the rebuild is going better than I first anticipated… we’ve got some of the junior kids mixing in with the seniors… hopefully there’s an opportunity there for them to get some senior games which should help their development,” he said.

“I think we’re primed to become more and more successful in the future, that’s really the goal at this stage.”

In recent weeks the Meres have been able to secure a number of recruits, most notably Hann’s twin brother Alex and key forward Michael Madden.