Gavin Bell - West Coast GM of Footy (14.07.2026)

**Mark Duffield** (0:00)
Welcome back to the SENWA studio out here at Optus Stadium. Tuesday morning in Perth, beautiful and sunny outside.
West Coast Eagles were under the roof at Marble Stadium at the weekend when they went down by 16 points to the Western Bulldogs. They were brave, they had their chances, thought their method was pretty solid, just couldn't quite execute when it came time to win or lose the match. Their football manager, Gavin Bell, joins me on the line now. Gavin, welcome.

**Gavin Bell** (0:30)
Good morning Duff, thanks for having me.

**Mark Duffield** (0:32)
Mate, you get to measure yourself against Brisbane and Freemantle over the next two weeks after a really strong performance against the Bulldogs. It must be exciting for your young group.

**Gavin Bell** (0:44)
Yeah, it certainly is.
We haven't won the games that we would like to have won so far, Duff, but we're certainly seeing improvement in the way we're playing. Like you put comments at the start there, mate, just the execution under pressure has been. Just missing at times and not hitting a scoreboard. So there'll be no bigger challenge at the moment than to play Brizzy into Fremantle. So we're really looking forward to that challenge and seeing what our side can do against two of the top teams of the comp.

**Mark Duffield** (1:13)
So Andrew McWalter said on Channel 7 News last night that he feels that you've made some significant ground this year. Where do you think the biggest improvement has come from?

**Gavin Bell** (1:25)
I think our collective system, defensively, we're certainly getting better.
Duff being able to maintain the ball in our forward half has certainly improved.
Across the board, we just feel like we're making some ground. It's not turning into wins at the moment, but we feel like we're working on our method and our process to become the team that we want to become. So it would have been nice to get a few more wins along the way, but we're really pleased with some of the progress that we're making with our players, and also our system as well.

**Mark Duffield** (1:58)
There's no better audit for your team defence than Brisbane. Their ability to kick through opponents who aren't quite on with the way they're defending them, that's going to be a real barometer for how much ground you've made, isn't it?

**Gavin Bell** (2:11)
Yeah, it certainly will be. And we saw what they did to another young side on the weekend. So they have the potential to score and score heavily and move the ball very, very efficiently. So we'll be all over that, and the guys will be put plans in place.
We haven't got right into the opposition stuff just yet. We're still finalising and finishing off our review from Sunday. But yeah, that'll be a huge test and a huge challenge for us. And just looking forward to seeing our guys have a crack at a really strong team in Brisbane.

**Mark Duffield** (2:42)
A big call by Andrew McWilder to put Willem Dersma on Marcus Bontempelli for periods of the game on Sunday. What was the thought thinking behind that and how do you reckon he went?

**Gavin Bell** (2:54)
Yeah, well, it was certainly an opportunity for Dersma to learn from one of the greats of our game. There's no doubt about it. And he, at the end of the day, many just thought that and the coaching staff thought that was the best match up for us to have an impact on the game and try and quell some of Bont's influence. At the end of the day, Bont was best on ground, I think, from both coaching groups. So, yeah, he had a huge impact. He's a seasoned veteran. But in saying that too, we're really pleased and impressed with the way young Ders is progressing, impacting games. I think we saw some more signs of the player he's going to become for us.
And we're really excited and optimistic about what Willam can grow into.

**Mark Duffield** (3:38)
There are two things, I reckon, that were really exciting for you at the weekend, Gavin. One was that the fact that Dersma was able to play down Bontempelli and yes, he lowered his colours, but he was also able to impact the game going your way. But the other thing was when you look at influence on the game, I didn't think there was much difference between Marcus Bontempelli's ability to influence the game for the Western Bulldogs and Harley Reid's ability to influence the game from your perspective.

**Gavin Bell** (4:06)
Yeah, no, Harley is really growing as a player and as a leader amongst our group. He's very, very vocal and speaks up in our meetings to try and help our team make some progress there too. So, yeah, couldn't be happier with the gains that Harley's made in his match conditioning, he's impacting games and we feel like he's playing his combative discipline. Football is growing. So, yeah, he's having a huge impact on our footy team and really liking the progress that he's showing.