Mark Duffield - The Editorial (03.08.2026)

**Mark Duffield** (0:00)
Hello, everybody. Welcome to the SENWA Radio Studio. We're out here at Optus Stadium. It is a Monday morning in Perth. We're here thanks to Beaumont Homes. Award-winning design, built to be loved forever. Sunny, but showers developing in our fair city today. A top of 23 degrees, made in WA for WA. This is Mornings with Mark Duffield on SENWA. Let's go to events at the weekend. West Coast took their second crack at fellow seller-dweller Richmond this season at the MCG yesterday. They got the same result as they did the first time around. That was an 11-point loss. It came about in a very different way, though. More of the ball, more inside fifties, 9.19, and at one point in the third quarter, 3.17.
So this is becoming a bit of a theme with the Eagles, and that is a lack of execution. Well, now, we know that bad kicking is bad footy, but it is more frustrating when you win just about every phase of the game, get the game on your terms, and then you don't close the deal. There's a combination of factors at play here, and I suspect that some of the younger players are starting to look for the end of the season. Willem Dersma has had a big year, but the end of the year has gotten big on him now, and I think the emotion he showed at the end of the game was probably, without knowing the inside story, probably a combination of frustration and fatigue. Jobe Shanahan is battling to have the same impact on games that he was having earlier in the season, and he had moments yesterday, but he kicked poorly for goal.
The 11-point loss will be incredibly disappointing for the Eagles fans, but it is overwhelmingly a reminder that this year has to be about improvement and development, and where the next year is about the same thing is really going to depend on how much they get out these last three games and then how much they can get out of their summer.
And I'll give you a couple of examples of even the good West Coast players still being incomplete and not the finished product. So Marcus Herbert has been a revelation since he came into the team, out of the mid-season rookie draft, but he needs to learn to narrow his focus on delivering the ball to teammates better placed than him, not on whether he can take a bounce and whether he can dodge someone. He's very good with time and space, but the main aim of the exercise is to get the ball to someone in a better position than you. Harley Reid is having a great season. He was their best player again yesterday. He was a monster at stoppages. I will be stunned if he doesn't win West Coast best and fairest comfortably, and I'll be mildly surprised if he isn't in the All-Australian squad. But the next big step forward for Harley is to turn the decisive power he wields around stoppages into meaningful inside 50 entries, pinpointing teammates and not just long bombs forward after fend-offs. If two of the most potent weapons your team has are deep forward, like Jake Waterman and Job Shanahan are, you have to take the ball forward in a manner that helps them, not in a manner that gives their opponents a better look at the ball than they have. So Harley's made much progress this year, but there is still a significant step forward for him to take. He gets out the front of stoppage, and he gets clear so often, and then he just bombs away.
If Andrew McWalder can make him more surgical, a very good player will become a genuine match winner.
Across town, and Fremantle have now had the most successful home and away season in the club's history. So top two and a home qualifying final is now an absolute lock, and the minor premiership is all but a lock. The question is, does Justin Longmure now try and manage key players like Josh Tracy and Luke Jackson in the run into finals, or does he back the week's break for wild card weekend to get them fresh for finals? The Friday win over the Bulldogs was dure and scrappy, but it was impressive how the Dockers unpacked a completely different game plan thrown at them by the dogs, something akin to the Uber flood that Luke Beveridge's predecessor, Terry Wallace, employed when he rolled the unbeaten bombers in 2000
There were, at times, as many as 15 Western Bulldogs ahead of Fremantle players trying to enter the forward 50 in a low-scoring first half on Friday. Fremantle managed to pick the dogs apart after half-time, and the 7-goal-to-1 second half left them comfortable 37-point winners at the game's end. So the Dockers and Longmure have become great problem solvers this year, and they found a different way to win again on Friday night. Your thoughts and questions are welcome. 487 736 736 That is the text line. 1312 55 is the Barra and O'Day open line. Barra and O'Day, because the little things are everything.