Less than a fortnight away from the start of the season proper, Werribee withstood Bendigo in the final term to win 13.12 (90) to 13.7 (85) at Bartercard Oval.

But Hickmott was far from disappointed, instead demonstrating the optimistic outlook and general disregard for the scoreboard in pre-season matches now commonplace among coaches at VFL and indeed AFL level.

"What we took out of the game was that when we're doing everything right, right down to the little things, even when we don't have the football, things start falling into place," Hickmott said yesterday.

"And I think the players are starting to understand that."

Bendigo's young team was bolstered with the inclusion of Essendon listed players Adam McPhee, Andrew Lee, Jay Neagle and Tom Bellchambers on Saturday.

Lee and Bellchambers both played full matches, McPhee kicked the first goal of the game and was rested after half-time, while Neagle suffered a minor ankle injury that ended his day prematurely.

Hickmott said the confidence of his youthful Bombers has continued to build, despite the loss to Coburg late last month.

"They're starting to get the confidence to take on our strategies and hit targets and they're learning to have faith in their skills and their running ability under pressure," he said.

"We always work to the game structure and skills are obviously always important and even though we improved on that over the weekend compared to three weeks ago, we can still work on things.

"The style of play we have and we're instilling in the guys is the type of game where we need 22 contributors to stand up for it to work."

Hickmott said Stuart Crameri, Rex Taylor, Josh Bowe and Brent Hartigan were the best, but said Jon Coghlan had also played well before injury.