Fremantle say there’ll be no excuses for a poor showing against the Swans on Saturday despite having their flight to Sydney cancelled on Thursday afternoon.

The Dockers’ scheduled 4pm flight was delayed for two hours on Thursday afternoon before it was cancelled due to mechanical problems.

They will instead leave for Sydney at 10am on Friday for their qualifying final against the Swans at ANZ Stadium.

The Dockers usually travel two days before an away match, and they had planned to do a walk-through session at ANZ Stadium on Friday.

That session will now have to take place on the morning of Saturday’s match.

Fremantle football operations manager Chris Bond said the flight drama was an inconvenience, but not a disaster.

“Our plan of attack is we always train the day we travel. So really, our training and preparation has been done,” Bond told Perth radio station 6PR.

“We’re not going to lose a training session. It will all be about recovery.

“We’ll leave Perth (Friday) morning at 10 o’clock. We’ll get (to Sydney) at 4.30pm. Players will have recovery, we’ll have our team meeting. We’ll do our walk and stretch on Saturday morning, and then play the game.

“It’s different to what our normal routine is, but there’ll be no excuses from our end.”

Fremantle players were on the plane for almost two hours before their Virgin flight was eventually cancelled.

“These things happen. When there’s technical difficulties with aircrafts, we’re better off making sure safety comes first, which is what’s happened,” Bond said.

“We all moved on really quickly.

“Once the decision was made, we knew that it’s best to get the players home, get them a good night’s rest in their own beds, get up at a normal hour (Friday) morning and get to the airport and fly.

“They moved on quickly. They’re a very mature and professional group. We know it’s not the worst situation we could be in, and we’ll be ready to go on Saturday afternoon.”