Danielle Laidley, The West Australian (04.08.2026)

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**Mark Duffield** (1:00)
Welcome back to the NCNWA studio out here at Optus Stadium on this Tuesday morning in Perth. 16.8 degrees and a few showers hanging around outside at the moment. Danielle Laidley played in the 1996 flag for the North Melbourne Football Club. She coached North Melbourne into the 2007 preliminary final against Port Adelaide. And she joins us on the show now. We'll talk a bit about West Coast. Danny, welcome.

**Danielle Laidley** (1:28)
Morning, Duff. How are you?

**Mark Duffield** (1:30)
I'm going all right. Danny, yourself?

**Danielle Laidley** (1:34)
Yeah, not too bad. Not too bad. Getting excited, getting towards September.

**Mark Duffield** (1:41)
Yeah, that always has a different feel about it. I heard Dermot Brereton say once that when they cut the grass at the start of September because you head into spring, and he said the smell of cut grass to him always meant footy finals. And Melbourne in particular does have that different feel about it when you hit September, doesn't it?

**Danielle Laidley** (2:02)
Yes, it does.
But let me tell you, the last few days, with the temperature being like it has been in Perth, and then you get to that dusk, and it actually feels like spring in Melbourne right now in Perth. And the weather turns in different ways, obviously, from Perth to Melbourne. But you can feel it's just around the corner.

**Mark Duffield** (2:33)
Now West Coast turned victory into defeat against Richmond at the weekend with poor kicking. Was it a disaster or a mishap in your eyes?

**Danielle Laidley** (2:46)
The four points would have been fantastic for the supporters and anyone who barracks for the West Coast Eagles.
And it would have been good with the inside of the football club, but in the big picture, does it really matter? I don't think so. You know, you can see improvement. They're still a long way off, though. You know, really for, you know, competing and getting into the top half of the ladder. They are, you know, quite a few years off, I think.

**Mark Duffield** (3:35)
Yeah, I tend to agree that they've got to find two or three more real A-grade talents, don't they, to sort of to spread the load a little bit more. A question from Tim Gossage.
He wanted to know, why do the Eagles go into attack wide all the time, instead of up the guts? What's the reason behind that?

**Danielle Laidley** (3:56)
Yeah, now, it's really interesting. So, and this, have a look at the way the West Coast moved the ball. They like to kick mark, kick mark. They don't go through the corridor. They'll go long down the line, and then when they go inside 50, they'll always go on the skinny side, which I think is what Tim is talking about.
And the thing about this is, even though they have the ball, they're playing defensively. They don't want to use the corridor or go through the corridor because of their skill execution, it turns over and those turnovers are very hard to score against. So that's what I think. If you have a look back to, I think it might have been the beginning of last year when West Coast came out and they used to ball through the corridor and they had the forward handball and they were playing quick.
But what was happening is that they were turning the ball over and getting scored against too easily. So what it's done is actually improve their defence, if that makes sense, by using this ball movement method. So really, I think they're defending as much with the ball in hand as when the opposition had the footy, if that makes sense.