HYDRATION and ice-vests are the order of the day, as North Melbourne prepares to face Port Adelaide in a 36-degree preliminary final on Saturday afternoon.
The AFL's heat policy – longer breaks and extra water carriers – will be in place, but for Emma Kearney's Roos, it's been a long build-up.
"It's not just the 24 hours leading up, it's the whole week. It's about hydration is the most important thing you can do, try and avoid going outside in the heat is probably the most important thing," Kearney told reporters on Friday.
"Then tomorrow – we had really good experience in round one going up to Brisbane, it was over 30 degrees there. Our medical staff were amazing. Every time we came off to the bench, they had ice vests for us, they had little bags of ice to chuck under our armpits just to cool your body down.
"For us as players, it's about cooling your body down as much as possible, then come game-day, it's about cooling yourself down on the bench."
Kearney will be returning from a seven-week lay-off following a hamstring injury, the longest stint on the sidelines the 35-year-old has experienced in her nine-season AFLW career.
She said she was "touch-and-go" to return for the qualifying final against Adelaide two weeks ago, but wasn't quite hitting her training loads.
"Yeah hammy's good. I've gone through a bit of a vigorous rehab, it's been long, bit of a rollercoaster at times, but feeling really fresh and looking forward to Saturday," she said.
"I've had opportunities to sit in the coaches' box, so good experiences for me. They're actually quite calm, which is really pleasing. Sometimes as a player you might be a bit reluctant to sit in coaches' boxes because you're not sure what the coaches are saying, but one thing I've learnt is Darren [Crocker] is such a cool, calm and collected coach.
"He's very measured in his approach. Even against Adelaide in that [qualifying final], when we probably didn't have the game looking like we wanted it, he was really calm at half-time, kept it positive, and that's how we were able to change the game.
"I'm actually a lot calmer watching than I am as a player. Most people know I have white-line fever like no other. I certainly felt a little calmer and more measured in how I saw the game from the sidelines."
Opponent Port Adelaide has been on a rampage, winning eight on the trot to blast its way deep in its first AFLW finals series, but the Roos themselves are on a 10-game winning streak.
"It's been really impressive, [Port Adelaide's] footy stacks up in finals. They're a highly contested side, they surge from stoppage, territory-based side, and that's really dangerous in finals," Kearney said.
"They've got really dangerous forwards – Gemma Houghton being one of them – so if they get the ball inside 50 quickly as possible, and they get one-on-one looks, they're really dangerous. So we have to try and nullify them in the contest. They're a high-pressure side, so if we try and get [ourselves] from inside to outside as quick as we can, hopefully that'll put us in a really good position tomorrow.
"For us, it's always about the contest. Finals footy is high pressure, so if we can try and nullify them in that area – they've had a bit of success against us in first quarters, where they've been able to bring that pressure and we haven't been able to absorb it great. If we can do that early, we know our fitness, our run on the outside, we'll be able to get over the top of them."
