Longmire said Hardwick called him immediately after his press conference to apologise but the damage was done.

"The comments after the game from Damien were completely unnecessary and unwarranted. They just weren't correct," Longmire said.

"We didn't play an extra defender, Richmond bring a player up around the ball and have been doing it for a long time. We just held our six defenders in place.

"If Damien didn't want to do that, he could have brought his forward back in and just played 6-6-6 and the issue would have been done.

"I'm not sure it's my role to walk up to Damien's coaches box, knock on the door and say 'what would you like us to do?' That's how it happened."

Longmire said he was disappointed Hardwick and other AFL coaches had begun making public comments about other teams.

"I thought that coaches were really collegiate and I was hoping that would still be the case, but we've got to be careful, I reckon, as an industry that we don't drop into this habit of potting other people and finger-pointing," he said.

"It's a bit of a challenging time for all of us and I just think we need to take a deep breath and help each other through this.

"Clearly we want to score more than three goals. There's a few things at play here.

"Damien called me straight after the game, apologised for the comments, which is appreciated, but as I said to Damien, they're out there. Now you've got to have a press conference and talk about it."

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There appears to be no respite for the Swans on the fitness front. Longmire confirmed the grim diagnoses for both Heeney and Kennedy, adding to what he said was the worst injury crisis he had ever confronted.

"I had coffee with [Isaac] this morning and he was hoping on the bright side but he was looking at his ankle, it was pretty big and swollen, and I think he was fingers crossed, but knowing there could be significant damage - and there was," Longmire said.

"We had a significant run [of injuries] last year. Seven at the back end of the year. But this has taken it to a new level.

"You can handle injuries across your list but when that becomes in one particular area, like height or defenders or forwards or whatever they are, [it’s very difficult]."