The Eagles Kicked Themselves Out of the Game - Eliza Reilly, CODE Sports (03.08.2026)

**Mark Duffield** (0:00)
Welcome back to the SNWA studio. We're out here at Optus Stadium. It is a Monday morning in Perth, just after 10 o'clock in the morning, 17.1 degrees outside, building to a top of 23 degrees. A sunny day, maybe some showers later in the day.
West Coast had their second 11-point loss to the Richmond Tigers this year at the MCG yesterday. Blustery conditions, the Eagles didn't handle it particularly well when shooting for goal. 9.19 was the scoreline. That cost them the game. It's generated a lot of chatter on the text line so far this morning. To talk through the issues around the game, Eliza Reilly from CODE Sports joins us. Eliza, welcome.

**Eliza Reilly** (0:44)
Good morning, Morning Duff. I think that's the definition of kicking yourselves out of a game.

**Mark Duffield** (0:48)
That was the definition of kicking yourselves out of a game.
Pretty frustrating watch, wasn't it? In the end, they had the game on their terms. They had it looking the way they wanted it to look. And unfortunately, their fours just couldn't kick straight.

**Eliza Reilly** (1:02)
Yeah, pretty much exactly that, Duff. The Eagles, I thought, dominated large periods of the contest and were the better side than Richmond across the ground, but just couldn't get rewards for their effort on the scoreboard. And I think, unfortunately, it's probably just a symptom of where West Coast are at.
You know, you walk into a rebuild and you sort of want to get to the stage where you're competing with teams above you on the ladder and towards the upper end of the ladder, which I feel like they've done this year by maybe a few games against Sydney and Fremantle. But you really want to be beating the teams that you're better at, better than. And the Eagles have done that this year, obviously, defeating Essendon at home, but now they've lost twice to Richmond, which could have been an easy eight points and climb them a little bit further up the ladder than where they currently are, which is third last. And the only teams behind them are Essendon and Richmond.

**Mark Duffield** (1:52)
So, clearly, the goal-kicking thing has become a mental thing for Jake Waderman. And unfortunately, Job Shanahan missed a couple as well yesterday that you would normally expect him to kick. Do you get the feeling that Jake isn't going to be able to fix this until summer comes around, that it's gotten inside his head and he's just going to need a summer of decompressing, emptying his brain out and trying to fill it with some more positive thoughts ahead of the next season?

**Eliza Reilly** (2:22)
I think, yeah, that's probably an accurate assessment of where things at, because, you know, it's been an all-season long issue now, and there was a slight period for maybe a fortnight or so when he managed to turn things around and get a five-goal game on the board. But unfortunately for Jake, I think, you know, when he kicked that one really close to the line in the third quarter yesterday, there was some expletives which the camera captured. And that's probably a summation of where his head's at, how frustrated he is, because as we've said of him all season, he's working, you know, his work rate, you can't question his endurance, his physicality. The delivery to him hasn't always been great, as you would expect with a young team. So he is having some difficult shots from, you know, the pocket and from long range. But it's just, yeah, it's a summation of where he's at, that he just hasn't been able to be the accurate goalkeeper that he once was in that all Australian year.
And I think as a holder, entire Eagles team had it really hard for themselves with their delivery inside 50 and taking really difficult shots, which may have contributed a bit to the inaccuracy.

**Mark Duffield** (3:27)
Yep. Also the northerly wind in Melbourne, which is a horrible wind.
And basically when that wind blows, it's very difficult to kick goals at EMCG cause it gets really swirly in there. And you have to know how to do it. And obviously the Richmond Tigers had more know-how around that than the Eagles did. I do wonder, and I said this at the top of the show, Eliza, whether the next step forward for a Harley Reed is less bombing into the forward line and more spotting up targets. And maybe that would give players like Waterman and Shanahan a few good and easier looks at goal early in games to get their confidence up. Because it's amazing how often Harley gets clear from stoppage and takes the ball from inside to outside himself, but then just goes long and high when if they were prepared to come up the pipe at him and just lead to him, they might be getting shots from 25 to 30 meters out directly in front.