ZAK JONES has apologised to his Sydney teammates for missing the Swans' vital clash with Essendon on Friday.
Midfielder Jones is serving a one-match ban for his off-the-ball strike on Richmond's Dan Butler.
The 22-year-old Jones was arguably Sydney's best player in their calamitous 0-6 start to the season but had sailed close to the wind discipline-wise on a couple of occasions before last weekend.
He was fined for rough conduct against the Western Bulldogs' Travis Cloke and again for striking Hawthorn's Luke Breust.
Some of Sydney's senior players spoke to Jones on Wednesday.
"You want to play on the edge, but to miss games is unacceptable and he apologised to the group this morning, which was accepted," Swans midfielder Dan Hannebery said.
"He's such an important player for us, that you don't want to have those sort of guys missing through those sort of ill-disciplined acts.
"A few of the guys mentioned something to him this morning and just said, 'Mate, we can't afford to lose you because you're a good player ... play on the edge, but you don't want to cross that line', so I think that's been dealt with."
Hannebery rated the come-from-behind win over Richmond as one of the best victories he had been involved in.
He said it had instilled belief in the players.
Sydney has won five of its past six games to fight its way back into finals contention.
Hannebery attributed their resurgence to the Swans narrowing their focus and concentrating on simple things.
"Getting our contested ball right, some of our effort off the ball, communication, real basic things like that," he said.
The three-time All Australian representative's form has lifted in recent weeks after he appeared off the pace in the early rounds.
"My form was down in the first couple of weeks, but like all the players I was working hard at training and simplifying the way we were going about it," Hannebery said.
Sydney face a surging Essendon at the SCG, but will go above the Bombers on percentage should they win.
"They are playing some incredible football at the moment, so we've got to be right on our game," Hannebery said.
