Numerous young players on AFL lists do not want to play football and have simply been swept up in the system, according to Swans coach Paul Roos.

In his final season as senior coach of Sydney, Roos has occasionally offered veiled criticism of younger members of his squad for a lack of commitment.

He believes the problems reflect a wider issue within the AFL, which has monopolised much of the outstanding athletic talent in Australia via a combination of aggressive drafting and generous wages for draftees.

"Where the frustration comes from, you know some of the boys if the game was amateur, you know there'd be some boys who'd walk out straight away," Roos told AAP.

"You know they haven't got the passion for the game, but they won't tell you that, because it's a good living, a good lifestyle, they never made the decision whether they want to play AFL footy and then they got drafted.

"Ultimately it comes down to the player and that's where it can become frustrating from the coaching point of view, you can tell them and tell them and tell them, but unless you've got a passion for the game it is very hard.

"Talent can only fool coaches for so long - you can get away with a certain amount of talent, and if you're enormously talented you can play for a certain amount of time, but at some point the game catches up."

Roos played under the old system where each club had an under 19s team, allowing clubs to view their potential recruits at much closer quarters in their formative years.

"The old under 19s system was so much better because you had a natural filtering system," he said.

"Talented kids come in, if they didn't work hard enough they'd never make a senior list, they'd never play seconds and they'd never play seniors.

"Now you've got talented kids who have no real desire to play AFL footy, that are on senior lists, and a lot of them are early draft picks and highly-touted kids who've come through the AIS.

"But simply they get swept up in the system and it really is not their passion and they don't want to do it."

In stark contrast is young Swan Dan Hannebery, who appears highly likely to claim the AFL's Rising Sar award after showing himself to be a worthy addition to the Sydney engine room.

"The thing that stands out about him, and it always does, is character, work ethic, desire to be successful, they're the common themes with guys who want to be successful," said Roos.

"That's certainly why part of this job is frustrating when you get guys who don't seemingly want to work hard - it's a simple formula.

"But his season's been very, very good and if he does win (the rising star) he'd be a very worthy winner."

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