West Coast coach Adam Simpson was straight to the point. "We're not happy," he said after his side had been held to an unlikely draw by the Gold Coast Suns, whom he wasted no time in praising.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
"You've got to give credit to Gold Coast, the way they played and the way they handled the night. We kicked ourselves out of it a little bit, but I thought they played better.
"The game wasn't played on our terms, and we didn't handle situations the way that we have been recently. I always thought the maturity of our group was still building, and we're not quite there yet, and the same with our coaches."
Simpson noted that on paper, the Eagles won many key facets of the game – nearly 30 more contested possessions and 10 more clearances among them – but it wasn't enough.
"You look at the stats, everyone's sort of got their numbers. Even some of our KPI's look good, but it just didn't feel like us tonight. Like I said, you've got to give credit to the Gold Coast and how they played, and what they did to deny us what we've been pretty good at.
"The collective wasn't quite on tonight … Sometimes you've got to go through situations where you are a bit off, but you still get it done. How you handle those situations – how you handle pressure, expectations is all part of the bigger picture. We're disappointed with the result of the game, but we'll learn from it.
"That's the game. You've got to be on all the time. We've been up for a long time and we've [got a] really tough run in front of us. This is all part of the journey, and we're not satisfied."
Gold Coast Suns coach said the draw felt like a victory. "From our point of view, it's like a win. It doesn't mean much to anybody else at the end of the day, but I think it's reward for their efforts.
Eade noted his side had also been unlucky, particularly in the third quarter, when a kick from Luke Russell that looked to have gone through for a goal was called touched by the goal umpire.
The decision was reviewed, but embarrassingly, there was no camera on the goal line, with only replays from in front and behind the goals available. "It looked a goal, because [Matt] Rosa's foot was on the line, and he was reaching forward.
By that logic he was over the line, so I couldn't believe that you would call that. And then, why there was no side-on view … You could argue that, that that could have cost us, and no doubt we had a bit of momentum at that stage.
"But it goes back to the middle and starts again. That's always the argument the other people say. Obviously it didn't dispirit the blokes, and that was pleasing as well … But hopefully they can get those sorts of decisions right in the future."
Eade praised many of his players, especially wayward star Harley Bennell, in his second game back from internal suspension. "Harley's game tonight was a lot better than last week's game. Harley had 38 last week; 28 tonight, it was so much better.
"He had seven tackles, he defended really well. He played on Gaff; Gaff's been averaging over 30 and he had 27. They were on and off each other but I thought he did a really good job."
