FOR THE second time in as many weeks, Sydney Swans coach Paul Roos has labelled his side’s recent dominance of an upcoming opponent "irrelevant".

The Brisbane Lions proved the insignificance of their five-year winless streak against the Swans last week, rolling Roos' men at the Gabba by 33 points.

Reigning Bob Skilton Medallist Jarrad McVeigh declared his side’s effort "soft" and "embarrassing" – a rare concession from a team that prides itself on hardness at the contest.

Now the Swans back up against Carlton, an opponent that hasn’t won in Sydney for 16 years and hasn’t beaten the Swans anywhere since round eight, 2000.

"In a sense, if you win 10 or 11 it becomes harder to win 12 [and] it becomes harder to win 13. Every game is different," Roos said before training on Thursday.

"[Carlton’s] got some super-talented young players who are now becoming mature players, so they’re going to be a very, very good side. They’re a lot different to the teams we’ve played, even going back to last year.

"Last year, we had a real nail-biter against them (a two-point win at Docklands) and we got a taste of what Carlton can produce over the next 12 months to five or six years."

Roos said he wasn’t using the Swans’ winning streak as motivation, adding it was unlikely that his Carlton counterpart Brett Ratten would do so.

"You want your players to be motivated to beat any team anywhere, any time," he said.

"Brett’s been around long enough that if he uses it as motivation, well and good. But I’m sure his motivation is to get to 3-1, regardless of who they play this week.

"I take no solace from the fact we’ve beaten them 10 or 11 times. It’s irrelevant going into Saturday’s game."

Despite the performance against the Lions, Carlton captain Chris Judd said on Tuesday that the Swans still remained among the competition’s elite teams when it came to playing contested, finals-type football.

"We’ve played in grand finals against Chris and the Eagles and I think he has a really good understanding of what it takes to play finals footy," Roos said of Judd’s assessment.

"Chris, in terms of footy, has been there and done that and seen everything so I take that as a real compliment to our group.

"We’ve got a younger team coming in now and our job is to get those seven or eight younger players playing finals footy as quickly as we possibly can."