ON THE FIRST day of Melbourne's pre-season campaign, coach Dean Bailey
has declared the club won't finish bottom of the ladder for a third
straight year.

Bailey said, barring any major mishap, the Demons would make further progression with its players and ladder position in 2010.

"We'll be trying everything we can not to finish last next year," he said from Junction Oval on Monday.

"There comes a point in time where you've got the players, you've got
the list and now you've got to develop them. That's where we're heading
next year.

"We don't want to finish last."

The former Essendon player is gearing up to coach Melbourne for a third season and believes the pressure is mounting.

"There is going to more pressure this year and there is going to be
greater pressure the following year and there is even going to be even
more pressure the following year. Why? Because of what we're trying to
do now – put games into players," Bailey said.

"Expectations are one thing, but you've got to level out the expectation to a degree where you can see players improving.

"How many games we win? It'll be based on the back of how many guys
improve and how many games we can put into those certain players."

Melbourne had three groups of players return for pre-season training on
Monday. Skinfolds and other measurements were recorded, with training
activities including weights and ground drills.

Cale Morton, Jack Grimes, Stef Martin, Jake Spencer, Kyle Cheney,
Jordie McKenzie and Shane Valenti were part of the first group that
returned. Two more groups of 10 to 12 will return later in the day.

More experienced players will return on October 19.

Bailey said the first group had returning in exceptional condition
after a six-week break. Although he encouraged the players to maximise
their break, he added it was difficult for the players to not be
active.

"These days, the condition you come back in is a really big statement
to make to the coaches and the club that: 'I'm serious about this
pre-season'," Bailey said.

"Not too many people stand up at the end of the year and say: 'I had a great season, but I had a terrible pre-season'."

Bailey said young midfielder Sam Blease, who broke his leg early in the
2009 season, would be gradually included into the main training
sessions.

"Sammy is doing some running and jogging, because he's a lot more
advanced than probably where we thought, considering the nature of the
injury that he had," he said.

"He's going to have a very controlled program up until Christmas, Sam,
so we won't be rushing him at all. But the young fella is really keen
to get going, but we've just got to try and control him, because he
hasn't done a lot in the last six months.

"He's done everything we've asked of him, so he's really keen, because
he's missed a whole year of football – it doesn't happen often in a
young man's career."

Bailey is also optimistic that second-year Demon Jack Watts can add more muscle over the pre-season.

At the moment he is 88 to 89 kgs. He is expected to enter next season
at a playing weight of 92 or 93 kgs. The plan is to have him play at 94
or 95 kgs in 2011.

I hope they don't finish last, pretty sad for a club with such a rich history.