PORT ADELAIDE head of physical performance Stuart Graham has praised the form of the AFL playing group, as they returned to training on Monday following the Christmas break. 

In mid-December, the group underwent an intensive pre-season camp on the Gold Coast to form a solid fitness base, prior to the festive period. 

Graham spoke to the media on Monday about pre-season load, which players have impressed him so far and how the rehab group is tracking.   

Graham on the overall health of the list 
“(They’re) in great shape, the list is in a healthy position as well. We had some post-season surgeries and all those guys are tracking really well and integrating back into training. So the list is healthy and the fitness level of the group has exceeded where we wanted them to be at, which is great news.” 

Graham on pre-season load 
“Clearly camp is a big part of our pre-Christmas foundation building with physical load and education, as well as standard-setting and cultural set-up. So based off that, we feel like we get our volume and base done pretty early, so then come January, we can get more into match play, drills and attack it that way and have a bigger focus there and more of a competitive focus with how we train and the intensity we train at.” 

Graham on pre-season camp 
“The challenge for them was the consecutive days, backing up the loads. So usually, we're sort of day on, day off but this time we went four or five consecutive days of on-legs and really stress them that way. After Christmas (they've) recovered and are in good shape and have a good base under their belt. For us it was having a look at the new guys really, both the recruits and the new draftees because it was a pretty brutal load to start with at a new club. They all handled it well, Ivan (Soldo) for the period of time he was with the group (was great) and then Esava (Ratugolea), he really attacked it and got through all sessions. Of the younger guys, Will Lorenz stood out to me. He got through everything with no fuss and maintained a good intensity throughout. “ 

Graham on sustaining the squad’s fitness 
“It's more the luck side of things and the injuries to key positional players (rather than) training related areas. We feel like we've got a foundation with good training history, particularly from the soft tissue side of things so we don't need to make radical change in that space.” 

Graham on who impressed on the first day back 
“There are a couple, in particular Lachie Jones. He's a great athlete and he can take himself to another level again and he's done that. Jase Burgoyne and Kane Farrell are two others that had some clear off-season focuses that they’ve wanted to work on and they’ve come back in great shape.” 

Graham on individual players 

Todd Marshall: “He had significant hip surgery post-season and he's really now turned a corner and he's about to integrate into training in the next one to two weeks, so progressing really well as planned. (His involvement in pre-season games) we’re keeping open, but it's looking promising. There are some tests clearly in how he performs in training and we need to tick all those boxes first but he's certainly tracking in the right direction. It was a hip impingement issue which was resolved, clearly he was hanging in late last year to manage it but now it's fully resolved and he's got free range of movement again and is training really well which is good.” 

Ivan Soldo: “He had minor finger surgery, which was an issue that was carried over from last year. It was nothing (too serious), we just decided with the timing of the Christmas break where he could still run (was good for surgery). He's now back into training so it was minor and hasn't implicated his training (too much).” 

Mitch Georgiades: “Mitch is tracking well. He's probably the best of the rehab guys at the moment, it's all ahead of timeline. We’ve got some functional tests and strength tests to get through with him but he's now getting more aggressive with his training and integrating into drills as well so we're really pleased with how he's going. (Whether or not he is available for Round 1) is open, there are a few things he's got to tick off but he's making the right moves to do it. Mitch is really diligent with his rehab and professional with how he goes about it and how he attacks it. He makes sure he's thorough with every process and he's been super compliant and I think that's what has accelerated his progress.” 

Charlie Dixon: “Charlie's good, Charlie's fully recovered from his foot issue from late last year and he's on a managed training load which based on his training history and age, that's normal for him.” 

Aliir Aliir: “Aliir had ear surgery over the pre-season so he's now back into training, we're just being over-cautious with that.” 

Trent McKenzie: “He battled on at the end (of last year) but he's fully resolved now. We used the pre-Christmas period to rehab him and get him to train really from now."  

Jason Horne-Francis: “Super exciting for him, this is the first pre-season he can fully immerse himself in. We set some pretty aggressive running targets. That was the thing he really wanted to focus on, his running capacity. We saw some glimpses of what he is capable of from a physical perspective (last season) so we challenged that and through the off-season, he sought personal trainers to help him and did the program thoroughly and has set himself up now to be one of our elite mid runners so it's exciting to see where that goes to. His calf surgery (last pre-season) was really the thing we were cautious with and it meant he could only do straight line running for the initial part of pre-season so it was the football exposure stuff that he lacked, which now he's getting that. We encourage all the guys to be curious with their training and seek out different people to get an edge and chase marginal gains with their improvements. Trav (Boak) took him under his wing and showed him a few things and he took a lot from that experience (training in the US during the off-season).” 

Travis Boak: “He's fronted up in great shape and he wants it and he's prepared himself to set himself up.” 

Josh Sinn: “Going well. He's still on a managed load, which we'd like to get him off at some point but just given the history of how he came into the program, he didn’t have a lot of training history so we have to be respectful of that in training him up. So he's getting more exposure now as the pre-season goes on. Certainly, we hope it will be a breakout year for him.” 

Willie Rioli: “Yeah he has (returned in great shape). He does the off-seasons well. He reaches out to a few of his training partners in Cyril Rioli and they help him through. He does the program really well and he's compliant to it and again has fronted up like he did last year, in good shape. It's really exciting (what he's capable of) and it's evident in his attitude, that's the great thing. The group gets excited by him because he does some pretty special things on field.” 

Ollie Wines: “He's been disrupted with pre-seasons and they're vital for him. He loves doing the work and volume and match play leading into Round 1 through training so he'll be set up for that. (The knee issue) is resolved and he's undertaken all the training sessions and he's going well.”