ENGLEWOOD — The power of friendship will be on display in the middle of a loaded Broncos defense.

For the first time, Alex Singleton is lining up next to his buddy Justin Strnad as the first-team inside linebackers in training camp.

“When you play with somebody for a while — and also me and him have been friends for a long time — you kind of just know and feel each other. There’s times on the field that he might be winded and gassed, and I might help him out with something. I might be hurting or something, and he helps me. When you have experiences like that over time, you start to build this bond together that’s unbreakable,” Strnad said after Friday’s practice at Broncos Park.

“We want to go to war with people like that. I love being able to play with him each and every day. We have that bond, and we’re looking to build on that this year.”

Singleton and Strnad have plenty of experience playing next to each other, but it wasn’t exactly the plan. After spending the first years of his career almost exclusively as a special teams contributor, Strnad was thrust into the starting lineup when Dre Greenlaw sustained an injury in last year’s camp and missed the first six weeks of the season. A suspension and a hamstring injury cost Greenlaw three more regular-season games.

“What you need to be able to play together, we already have,” Singleton said earlier in camp. “It’s really easy to just get out there and just kind of be in a rhythm. I feel like the whole defense is really that way.”

Strnad was productive enough last season — 58 tackles, 4.5 sacks and an interception — that the Broncos felt comfortable enough to waive Greenlaw, who’s since returned to San Francisco. In March, Strnad got rewarded with a three-year contract worth $18 million. The bank account changed, but the approach didn’t.

“I just treat it the same,” Strnad said. “Every day, it’s awesome to be out here. I’m blessed to be out here.”

Now, the 29-year-old is a key piece in the middle of a defense that has no shortage of star power up front and on the back end. Whether the Broncos have the kind of defense that wins championships could be decided by the buddies at inside linebacker.

“(I) attack every day and get better each and every day no matter what the contract is, what the situation is. The goal is a Super Bowl and come out here and get better, help this defense win games. … Our ultimate goal is to hoist the Lombardi,” he said.