The AFL Premiership contender nobody is talking about

The West Coast Eagles have quietly snuck up on the rest of the AFL, put their eagle wings over our eyes and menacingly asked ‘remember us?’

Adam Simpson's Eagles were able to slip under the radar thanks to a variety of circumstances in the first half of the season.

Their lacklustre 3-3 start - which included a couple of drubbings - took the reigning premiers out of the spotlight, while the Cats' blistering 12-2 start ensured the football world’s attention was justifiably diverted to Geelong.

Collingwood and the GWS’ own first-half campaigns were almost as impressive, further relegating the Eagles into ‘out of sight, out of mind’ status.

Yet, it seems everything has changed over the past few weeks.

Within a blink of an eye the Eagles have won eight of their last nine matches and now sit second on the ladder, representing the biggest challenge to a potential Cats’ flag.

And, while sure, the Eagles ascension towards the top has been assisted greatly by the Giants and Collingwood seemingly falling apart before our eyes, it is to take nothing away from what West Coast has accomplished over the last few months. 

What’s been most startling about West Coast's resurrection has been an extremely uncomplicated game plan that’s all about going as long and direct as possible.

The Eagles are fully aware that there is no other team in the competition with a twin tower offense even in the vicinity of what the Josh Kennedy and Jack Darling tandem provides them, which has promoted a strategy that aims to get the ball down to those guys as quickly as possible without taking short-cuts.  

The Eagles have a significant lead on the rest of the competition from a kick to handball ratio under Adam Simpson, seemingly caring little for the handball. No team in the competition has less than the Eagles' 1882 total, which is a full 102 less than the next team, Brisbane.

In many ways, it’s a rather old-school, no-nonsense approach to the modern game, yet when your team possesses the kind of foot skills of the likes of Shannon Hurn, Lewis Jetta, Andrew Gaff, Dom Sheed and Luke Shuey, in addition to the Kennedy-Darling focal points, it would be insane for the Eagles to not want to move the ball via their feet. 

The Eagles are kicking the ball almost twice as often as they are handballing, which are numbers that hark back to the nineties North Melbourne teams and their famous ‘Pagan’s Paddock’ philosophy, which was similarly motivated by getting the ball into space for Wayne Carey to do his thing inside forward 50.

Oh, and who was such an important midfield cog of those nineties North teams? You guessed it, Adam Simpson, who played in the Roos’ 1996 and 1999 premiership teams.

Simpson’s approach to coaching has, of course, paid huge dividends, with the Eagles in 2019 bettered only by the Cats as far as goals per inside 50's are concerned. The Eagles direct play is very much getting bang for it's bucks.

The Eagles machine-like efficiency was an instrumental component of them claiming last year’s AFL Premiership, with the same formula propelling their 2019 drive.

One of the most alluring aspects of any sport is the myriad of ways it can be played, reinvented and re-imagined.

A world where we have every team in every competition deploying the same game plan and strategy exists in some kind of dystopian sporting universe that would reduce analysis down to simply a reading of the final score.

It’s why taking a ride in Adam Simpson’s time machine is such an endearing experience, and a reminder that beauty can indeed reside in simplicity. 

Simpson's intimate understanding of the Eagles' playing list, as well as the strategies he devises working to utilise the talent at his disposal, makes for such refreshing analysis. It’s also, incidentally, what’s been working so incredibly well with Rhyce Shaw's Kangaroos and their own rags-to-riches story of 2019.  

There’s still a lot of football to be played this season, but you can be sure of at least a couple of things: a) the Eagles will be there when the whips start cracking, and, b) that while there, they’ll be looking to get the ball quickly onto their boot.

Did you enjoy this article? Leave a comment below, or join the conversation on the Stats Insider Twitter or Facebook page.