When Rob Wright returns to Sydney on Sunday to take on the team he left at the end of last season, he'll see an outfit that looks similar on the surface, but is vastly different on the court.
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The Swifts retained eight of the 10 players who were coached by Wright last year: Sophie Garbin and Kate Eddy are in the squad this year at the expense of Amy Somerville and Emma Tickner.
But since Wright's shock departure to ultimately link with Collingwood as their defensive mentor, his old team has changed – and improved – substantially.
New coach Briony Akle has already engineered two wins from the opening four rounds, just one shy of the tally for all of last season.
Those wins came against the Queensland Firebirds and the Giants, two teams who are inside the Super Netball top four.
"He has a bit of insight into how we go about things, but with a new coach we've changed how we play this year," Swifts defender Maddy Turner said.
"They can only go on what we've put out this year and go by the footage, not how we went last year.
"The big change has been our confidence and the way we play and the trust in each other – we believe in each other."
Wright's new team is languishing at the wrong end of the Super Netball table with just one win in four rounds, but their star-studded line-up has put together patches of frighteningly good netball this season.
They trailed premiers Sunshine Coast by nine points in the final quarter last weekend and in the blink of an eye had the margin back to two, which turned out to be the final margin.
"They've got stars all over the court and I think they've been unlucky a few times to miss out on the win," Turner said.
"Last week they showed the same grit that we've shown in previous games to come back in that last quarter. Both of us will be looking to get up before the last quarter and not leave it to the last minute like we have been."
The Swifts tried launching a comeback of their own against the ladder-leading West Coast Fever last round, but finished off on the wrong end of a nine-point margin.
Coach Briony Akle said the focus this week had been on maintaining possession.
"We just can't give easy ball away and our week has been spent on basically treasuring the ball and getting that percentage of conversion rate up," Akle said.
"I think we got 11 turnovers in the first quarter [last week] and that's a pretty mighty effort against that team.
"We're getting a lot of ball back. If we play that well against them and get the same amount of ball and actually convert it, hopefully we'll do well."
