South Sydney coach Michael Maguire insists the Rabbitohs have learned the heartbreaking lessons from successive NRL preliminary finals losses.

Souths have made it through to a playoff for a grand final berth for the third straight year under Maguire, who took over at Redfern in 2012, after heartbreaking defeats to Canterbury and Manly the past two seasons.

The Rabbitohs face bitter arch-rivals the Sydney Roosters in Friday night’s first preliminary final and former school teacher Maguire says the experience gained from their finals exits will come to the fore against the premiers.

“You learn lessons,” Maguire said at the NRL’s coaches’ call on Monday.

“Experience is a big part of going through that period of the year.

“For us, we’ve had seven new players in our team, so those players haven’t learned anything other than just playing and doing the things that we’re doing right now.

“I’ve got a young, very enthusiastic squad with some great senior players that are leading the way and we’re all aware that we need to play at our best this Friday because we’re playing against a very good team.”

Maguire believes Souths aren’t alone in feeling the weight of expectation at the business end of the season.

“I think every team feels expectation when you’re playing in this arena, so it’s no different to the four of us,” he said.

“We’ve all got the same expectation of going into the game that we’ve been working hard for all year.

“We understand that we’re playing against a team that won the grand final last year and two minor premierships, and they have quality across the park.

“For us, our expectation is to work really hard for each other and play to the potential we can.”

Part of that weight is the five-decade long wait since the Rabbitohs last tasted premiership success in 1971.

“It’s more everyone else outside that’s talking about it,” he said.

“I wasn’t born 43 years ago.

“That’s part of the club, every team has some sort of history in it. But the history is done.

“We’re in the present now of doing the things that we can control and we’ve been training well.

“We’ve had a good week’s training and we are looking forward to Friday.”