Thoughts on the match, Simmo?

“It started at WAFL Eagles this afternoon. We must have had 12 debutants for WAFL level. Just to see the effort they brought, they went down to Perth, but it always gives us good energy, and then the crowd tonight was fantastic. Forty-plus thousand, almost a full house for what’s allowed, and then the boys stood up. Pretty ruthless in the first half in particular. The mids were giving us a real contest and the forwards were capitalising, and our backs have been good all year. But the second half we dropped off a little bit, so there’s a little bit to work on.”

The first half was where the game was won, how proud are you of what the guys produced there?

“Port are a very good side. They haven’t lost too much the last 12 months. They did a number on us last year up in Queensland and they would have had a lot of belief and confidence. They’re a very good side. To do what we did, we’re pleased. It seems like there’s a bit of that going on this weekend, round three, it was a bit random with some of the results. Games were a little bit different, teams came with a different strategy, so I thought we were pretty smart with the way we worked through it – our leaders were – but next week’s a new week, we’ve got the Saints back in Melbourne.”

It looked like Gaff played more inside (midfield), can you talk about what you tried to do with the way he was playing?

“Sure. We did nothing. He just played his normal role. As I spoke to you during the week, people come up and down in form a little bit. If you have eight weeks in a row, or significant periods of time (out of form) … but it’s been two games. I let him do his thing. There really wasn’t anything from an instructional point-of-view.”

How is Luke Shuey?

“I think he has done a minor hamstring again. That was the sour part of the night, I suppose. Really feel for him.”

How significant was his role? He starred in the first half especially.

“I think all of our leaders have really stood up over a number of years, but Luke’s game awareness around the ball and stoppages and organisation, that’s probably what we don’t see. He had 26 or 27 touches in 60 minutes but what he did from an organisational point-of-view was what we missed last week, so we need people to step up when he’s not there.”

How bad was the hamstring?

“I think it is something he has done before. Feels like it is going to be a standard 21-dayer. We’ve tried every different program under the sun, so we’ll keep going back to the drawing board until we get it right.”

How is he holding up? He does so much work to get back and to do it first game back…?

“It’s tough. Injuries happen, you’ve got to be pretty resilient in this competition but when you have a continual issue and he couldn’t be any more professional, it’s tough. We’ve got to put our arms around him and there is worse things in the world but he’s dealing with it.”

It it frustrating that you couldn’t have done much more from a management point-of-view? He played 70 minutes, so it’s not a fatigue issue?

“We’ve just got to dig a bit deeper. Not sure how much (more) we can dig. We’ve dug pretty deep. We’ll keep working.”

How did you like the Naitanui, Allen combination?

“It was a bit of a risk. We thought Oscar, it’s not his natural position, but I thought he competed really well in the middle. He’s a competitor. He probably can’t do it all year – we’ll bang him up too much – but I thought tonight we needed him to stand up. We knew they were a pretty quick, talented side, so we went a bit smaller. Nic obviously held up his end, they looked pretty good in there. Oscar held up his end as well.”

Jarrod Brander showed a bit tonight as well?

“Yeah, we’re still working through his first 30 to 50 games. Trying to find a role for him at WAFL to get him used to the game awareness and speed of what is going to happen at AFL – he’s missed that because we didn’t have any (WAFL) footy last year, along with Petruccelle and some of these guys who have been in and out. They’ve still got time. We’ve got to get games into them, while there’s leaders around that can show them the way hopefully we can develop them.”

Do you get time in the box to appreciate Liam Ryan?

“I did say ‘if you’re stuck on Aliir Aliir just go for your marks’ and he’s gone ‘alright’. He does some really special things. He’s building his fitness and he’s building his form. What is pleasing for us is he does those special things but his work off the ball has been a really surprise situation for us since we recruited him.”