Good enough to keep the dream alive. Good enough to remain part of the September action. Not quite good enough to beat the competition’s best at the sharp end of the year.

The 2012 season was satisfying, to some extent, but the gap between a good finals team and a premiership threat was proving a difficult transition to make. The West Coast Eagles won 15 games and on occasions were outstanding, but when the heat was really on, they could not maximise the opportunity.

If anything, this season again galvanised the view that a team in the west needs to finish in the top four to have a realistic chance of winning the flag. There needs to be a little wriggle room and without the comfort of placing in the top four it inevitably became too tough.

The Eagles finished fifth, to earn one home final, and they were intent on making the most of it when North Melbourne ventured to Patersons Stadium.

If North went in with the pre-game plan of sticking with the hosts in the first quarter, taking the crowd out of the contest and then plotting their way forward from that juncture, then it all went up in smoke pretty early.

West Coast was intent on crushing the Roos hopes early and it came through a vicious first-quarter assault that saw them rattle on seven unanswered goals.

Effectively the Roos were out of the contest by quarter time as West Coast marched to an emphatic 96-point win – Jack Darling, Josh Kennedy and Andrew Embley each kicking for goals as the hosts won 24.18 (162) to 9.12 (66)

That gave the Eagles a shot of confidence ahead of the first semi-final, despite coming off a six-day break because the State Government had a deal which locked a rugby fixture in at Patersons Stadium on the Saturday night, forcing West Coast to play the Roos a day later.

West Coast carried the impetus forward, kicked the first four goals and caught Collingwood on the hop, controlling play through the midfield. The Eagles were winning the clearances and it was eerie seeing a 65,000-strong crowd mostly silent.

The Collingwood players simply couldn’t get their hands on the ball. But everyone knew the Pies would eventually settle and they did. Their quality players like Scott Pendlebury, Dane Swan and Dayne Beams began to create opportunities and by quarter-time the margin had been cut to just nine points.

It was an arm wrestle until the third quarter when the defining moment in the match came from Dale “Daisy” Thomas. Relatively quiet in the first half, he exploded to life with three goals in the opening minutes of the third stanza. Collingwood was in front for the first time in the match, impetus was with them, their army of fans were boisterous and they were on their way.

That burst from Thomas flipped the game on its head. A half-time deficit became a 10-point advantage. In the end the Pies shot clear to win by 13 points, thus ending the Eagles season.

The platform for the finals assault was laid when West Coast won eight of its first nine matches, including an epic round four clash with eventual Grand Finalists, Hawthorn.

Winning that game seemed highly unlikely when, for the first time in 25 completed seasons – and four games – the Eagles were goalless at half-time. They trailed 0.12 to 2.7 in a remarkable contest.

A look at the scoreboard would suggest a night of horrendous storms had hit the city. But that was far from the case. A couple of mild rain belts slipped through and made conditions a little slippery, but nothing too severe.

Despite a first half without a major, the Eagles recovered to score a pulsating victory, 5.21 to 5.16 on an evening where the pressure from both teams was intense, and despite missed opportunities, was a fantastic advertisement for our game.

It was a match with some great individual battles, none more so than the absorbing clash between Eric Mackenzie and Lance Franklin, a fight quite literally won on points by Mackenzie, given Buddy kicked 1.6.

While the season had its moments, it also had its issues as injuries to key players again had an impact.

Mark LeCras and Mark Nicoski played no part in the campaign while Josh Kennedy and Andrew Embley spent three months in rehabilitation from serious injuries. The latter pair both returned and played in the finals, but their presence earlier in the season might have helped the club acquire the desired position in the top four.

The club still managed to win 15 games, but it required at least one more to be in the top half of the eight.

There were some personal highs in 2012 with Dean Cox becoming just the fifth West Coast Eagles player to reach 250 games, behind Glen Jakovich, Guy McKenna, Drew Banfield and Peter Matera.

Quinten Lynch surpassed the 200-game milestone while Daniel Kerr celebrated a double century.

Scott Selwood won the Club Champion Award ahead of Cox and Shannon Hurn. Jack Darling and Andrew Gaff, each in just their second season of senior football, rounded out the top five which augured well for our future.

Darling was also the club’s leading goal-kicker with 53, with much depending on his output in the extended absence of LeCras, Kennedy and Nicoski.

West Coast also found that dealing with new AFL free agency rules would be a challenge.

As clubs were learning to adjust with the on-field implementation of the substitute rule, introduced in 2011, free agency saw the Eagles lose long-time stalwart Lynch to Collingwood.  

In addition Koby Stevens asked to be traded as he searched for more consistent opportunities and he landed at the Bulldogs.