Greetings all, and welcome to Rick’s Footy Blog round eight! This is my first blog in quite some time where we’ve come off the back of a loss. I’ll be honest kids, I don’t like it. I have become accustomed to a certain standard of victory in the past few months. And now to have to deal with defeat? Well I’m going to put it out there - defeat tastes like rubbish. And I don’t like it.

Does that make me spoilt? Maybe. But we have been spoilt over here at West Coast for a while, especially last year. With so many outstanding players in such remarkable form, we have become used to a victorious way of life. And now with these mounting injuries, we’re having so many of our boys ripped away from us, like a blankie being ripped from a cold little child.

But let me stop before I get too melodramatic! Because we’re going to be ok. Last weekend we did see a lot of our best 22 out with either injury or suspension. But let’s see who we’ve got returning to the side this week - Adam Selwood, Will Schofield, Nic Naitanui and Matt Priddis (pending his concussion test.) Just a couple of big names in there!

With Schoey joining the legends of Glass, Waters, Hurn and Mackenzie in our back line; Sellers and Priddis joining the all-star midfield mix of Kerr, Rosa, Gaff, Shuey and Scotty Selwood just to name a few; and Nic Nat dominating in the ruck, we’ll be sweet. And its worth mentioning some of the boys in our forward line this week - Josh Hill, who has just been a goal-kicking machine of late, is joined by Jack Darling, Quinten Lynch and Dean Cox. There’s no way St Kilda’s defenders will be able to out-mark these giants.

So there we go people! After a devastating result last weekend, I am confident that our boys will bounce back this weekend and will be hungrier than ever to take the four points against St Kilda.

Look out Saints, we’re coming for ‘ya.

Love, Rick.