COLLINGWOOD skipper Scott Pendlebury expects the Magpies to play finals in 2017 despite finishing outside the final eight for the past three seasons.
The Magpies finished 12th in 2016 with just nine wins but Pendlebury said he would be bitterly disappointed if they didn't rise up the ladder in the final year of Collingwood coach Nathan Buckley's contract.
"I'd be very surprised if we don't play finals next year," Pendlebury said on Friday night, fresh from winning his fourth-straight Copeland Trophy as the club’s leading player for 2016.
"We've got the list that is good enough to play finals football and to really challenge."
He said while he expected some people would baulk at the captain setting such an expectation, there was no point in shying away from the pressure.
The make-up of the Magpies’ list remains uncertain with the trade period starting on Monday but several changes are expected.
Dane Swan, Alan Toovey and Brent Macaffer have retired, Travis Cloke and Jack Frost are looking to be traded, while free agent Nathan Brown's future is uncertain, although he is expected to leave.
Pendlebury said the Western Bulldogs’ performance in winning four finals in a row to claim the flag from seventh had changed the sense of what is possible.
"[You can] just get to finals and then see what happens from there," Pendlebury said.
The 28-year-old is now one of Collingwood's most decorated and consistent players, however he says a premiership drives him, and that team success is the only measure he uses to rate a season.
