North Melbourne coach Brad Scott doesn't want to lie, or talk his team down. As he named a largely unchanged side for Friday night's match against Sydney, he said he genuinely believed his side were the real deal.
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"The facts are the facts, there's no point in lying to the players, and they've beaten all the good sides.
"Say that's irrelevant, say it's a long time ago, but big games in finals we've won."
Scott has tinkered with his side, replacing the injured Jamie Macmillian with Ben Jacobs.
Rookie tall defender Joel Tippett has been named as an emergency, with Scott leaving open the option of bringing him in to face Sydney's forward forest depending on weather conditions and potential match-ups.
"We want to have a look at our defensive match-ups. We'll have a look at things like Sydney's selection, the weather, all those things."
Jacobs, a utility traded from Port Adelaide who has struggled to win a consistent berth, was dropped from the side for North's victory over Geelong after Brent Harvey returned from suspension.
Macmillian injured a hamstring in the win and, despite progressing well on his recovery, he hasn't come up in time for the clash.
The Roos have been big-game players this season, knocking over the entire top four while also losing matches against cellar-dwellers like Brisbane Lions.
"I've been really pleased with the attitude of our players that we've got a job still to do. We're certainly not satisfied with what we've achieved so far.
"We've got supreme confidence that if we bring our best and limit what Sydney is good at, then we can prevail."
Scott described Harvey's escape from suspension as a bonus.
"It's just an added bonus, Boomer's going to play the role we ask him to play, he's going to do it to the best of his ability.
"But the players have real confidence that we could have got the job done without him as well.
"They might have said it, but whether they believed they were good enough to do it without Boomer - they probably may not have believed it before, but they certainly believe it now."
Sydney coach John Longmire said despite the fact that Harvey is in his 19th season, he was actually playing better football because North has added a strong cohort of midfielders around him.
"To be playing till he's 36 and playing at the level that he is now ... it looks as though he could play for another four years and it's quite remarkable.
"The good thing from his angle is they've added some other players around (him), players like (Sam) Gibson and (Nick) Dal Santo and (Daniel) Wells.
"Those players have actually helped him and will continue to help him play more good footy in the future."
Lachie Hansen and Leigh Adams were both ruled out before training on Thursday after failing to recover from injuries.
Adams suffered a concussion in North's round 23 win over Melbourne. He missed last week's final against the Cats. Despite training strongly during the week doctors have advised him to miss another match.
"'Patch' won't play. He's close, but he's not quite right. He saw a specialist whose advice was to err on the side of caution and he'll miss one more week," Scott said.
"But the good news is he's been able to train fully and get a lot of training under his belt and he'll be available for selection next week."
Hansen has struggled all season to overcome a chronic groin complaint.
"He trained on Wednesday but not quite well enough. He was very close. We'll keep training him and rehabbing him and hopefully he'll be right for next week," Scott said.
