COACH Brad Scott will keep asking his Bombers charges to be aggressive at the contest after their well-publicised "Essendon edge" fell short against Sydney.
Essendon went at the Swans on Saturday but lost by 30 points, while Peter Wright received a four-match ban for his mid-air bump that concussed Harry Cunningham.
Swans star Tom Papley later labelled the Bombers' tough approach a "facade".
"We were very pleased with our players' intent on the night and in the contest. We want our players to give maximum effort every week," Scott said.
"You can call it whatever you like but what we focus on is just maximum effort and our players giving maximum effort, 100 per cent of the time and that's really what we're focused on.
"We want to be in control of our actions and really focused on the ball and being hard in the contest but mostly it's about effort.
"The review of our game, our effort was at a high level but the reality is we got beaten by a better side on the day.
"Sydney was better than us, and we learned our lessons in terms of where we can improve, but I was really pleased with the step forward in terms of our intent and our effort levels."
Scott stressed the edge he wanted was about fierceness in the contest.
"We're really clear on what it is. It's about effort in the contest and it is a physical game," he said.
"The best teams over history, and the Swans have been as good as anyone over time, have been quite fierce in the contest and you've got to direct that the right way and our players are very clear as to how we direct that.
"Emotions run high in games and we work really hard on emotional regulation and making sure our players direct their emotion and aggression in the right way. But it is a contact sport.
“We aspire to be a good team, I would say we’re not where we want to be right at the moment, but to be a good team you’ve got to be fierce in the contest and you've got to have maximum effort."
On Wright's suspension, Scott felt the club had no legitimate avenue to clear the key forward of wrongdoing under current rules.
The Bombers argued Wright's penalty should only be a three-match ban, given the 27-year-old took actions to avoid an even more serious injury to Cunningham and showed contrition in the aftermath.
Scott said Essendon believed they risked a suspension of six matches or more if Wright had pleaded not guilty, and felt it was impossible to make a case to fight the charge.
"(The AFL) have iterated the rules to a point where some of the finest legal minds in our country can't find a way to challenge the charge," Scott told reporters on Wednesday.
"We really want to encourage our players to make the ball their object and we still feel that Pete made the ball his object.
"He had to make an absolute split-second decision and the reality is sometimes players are going to get that slightly wrong."
Mason Redman will return from suspension against St Kilda on Saturday while Darcy Parish will be available after missing the opening two games with a hamstring injury.
Andrew McGrath (ankle) was limited to running laps on Wednesday while Will Setterfield (knee) was sidelined.
Jake Kelly will return from illness and Harry Jones is in contention to replace Wright.
Dylan Shiel will play VFL after he was a late withdrawal from the Bombers' reserves last week.
