SAM Weideman says fellow key forwards Jesse Hogan, Cameron Pedersen and now former teammate Chris Dawes played an important role in his development in his first year at the club.

The emerging forward said the trio all made a genuine effort to help him in his first year at the club.

“They have all really helped me develop my movement patterns as a forward,” he told Melbourne TV. 

“I found it pretty tough early days and I was struggling moving around and adapting to the structures of the forward line.

“I think they helped me plenty and I’m really happy they took me under their wing and looked after me this year.”

Weideman said he watched players such as Matthew Pavlich, Nick Riewoldt and Tom Hawkins closely this year.

“The way he uses his body (Hawkins), I try and emulate what he does and build on what he does.”

“Nick Riewoldt runs around the ground and takes a lot of marks up the ground.

“I take a lot of little clips from what they do … it’s a good teaching method for me to develop as a forward.” 

Weideman said he was pleased to get through his first year in the AFL, but was eager to take it to another level in 2017.

“I really wanted to try and build myself up. I had a pretty injury struck 2015, so I wanted to get games under my belt, which I did. I really wanted to get a full year of footy, which was important for me,” he said.

“You’re going to be running wherever you play and you’re going to have to have a pretty strong fitness base, because it’s become such a running game now. You’ve got to be able to compete in the air and body-on-body, so you’ve got to have that mix.

“But I think running is probably the main thing for me, being a centre half-forward – I want to try and run my opponent around and try to take marks around the ground, along with one on ones, so that’s my main focus.”