The Demons battle Old Launcestonians at 2pm at Invermay Park.

"We've been playing a bit safe so we're going to be brave and take the game on a bit more this weekend," Lockhart said.

The coach is hopeful injured midfielders Daniel Viney and Ty Ponting will be right to play.

The Dees are eager to bounce back after losing their home qualifying final to Old Scotch by 15 points last weekend.

"Training on Tuesday night was unbelievable and it was probably one of the best nights we've had," Lockhart said.

"I think a lot of it's probably a little bit of embarrassment with the performance we put up."

Kicking more goals is high on the agenda for Saturday.

"We've got to win the contest in the middle. From goal to goal, it's probably a shorter ground compared to others. It looks short when you're out there," he said.

"So winning it out of the middle will give our forwards best opportunity.

"We believe our back line kept Old Scotch to a losing score but we just couldn't score ourselves. So a lot of our focus is on keeping the ball in and getting repeat entries so we can have more shots on goal."

OLs have ended up with home ground advantage despite finishing fifth. The Dees finished second on the table.

Lockhart said his group was looking forward to playing at Invermay Park.

"It doesn't faze us being their home ground because the past few years a lot of finals football has been played there," he said.

"We've been in the past six finals campaigns playing at Invermay Park so we like the ground and it's a great surface.

"So you're not going to be pulling your feet out of slosh or mud.

"It might be a bit slippery if it's a bit wet. We're pretty keen on playing on that ground and using our speed on the outside."

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OLs co-coach Richard Howe is likewise looking forward to playing on one of the state's premier surfaces.

"It's nice to get a home final especially as we finished fifth," he said.

"We're probably lucky in some way. Hopefully the weather clears up a bit and becomes a bit nicer for us."

Howe said OLs had great respect for Lilydale.

"They've been the best team of the competition for the past four to five years," he said.

"We have a lot of respect for their guys and they've been the benchmark.

"We're definitely not going to take them lightly.

"I know they've probably got a couple of players they'd love to have playing with them. But at the same time, they've still got some good big-game players that'll step up to the occasion when they have to."

Howe spoke of the important role defence would play in the match.

"We'll pretty much do the same as what we've tried to do the past month," he said.

"It's pick up our intensity and spread well across the ground. Our a defensive pressure is something we've worked on over the past month.

"That's probably going to be a key to this game. Both defences will be in pretty good stead.

"Their defensive unit got the better of us at Lilydale (round 18) and probably shaped the way that game went after half-time."

OLs will look to make the best of their forward-50 entries.

"We base a lot of our game on controlling the ball and giving our forwards the best opportunity to get there but at the same time we've got a few more players back in this week from last time we played them," he said.

"We don't want to bomb it in so much on the heads of (Lilydale defenders) Trent Griggs and Louis Venn and those sorts of guys as they play a good chop off role down there.

"We'll try and utilise our skills and smaller guys to run around and create those opportunities."

Howe said the line-up would be largely be unchanged from last weekend and they had a list of 24 to choose from.

Luke Johnston played his 100^th senior game last weekend.

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