WEST Coast coach John Worsfold has refused to blame a challenging injury toll for the Eagles' 61-point loss to Essendon on Saturday night at Etihad Stadium.
The Eagles dropped their first game for the year in dramatic circumstances after the Bombers stymied their ability to score during a seven-goal-to-none third quarter.
While Worsfold looks set to have Nic Naitanui, Adam Selwood, Ash Smith and Will Schofield at his disposal next week - and expects Matt Priddis to be available, despite his first-quarter concussion - he says an undermanned outfit against the Bombers isn't the reason they lost.
"I wouldn't say [the injuries] have taken a toll tonight but I would say that we got outplayed," Worsfold said.
"Essendon looked sharper and used the ball better, and really that was the key.
"You can't measure what the injuries' effect is, but that's what it was."
Worsfold acknowledged players such as Mark LeCras, who is out for the year with a knee injury, were nearly impossible to replace.
But he said injuries didn't diminish other players' ability to go out and play to the level the Eagles expected.
"If that means they perform below their own level, they've let the team down and themselves down," he said.
"I'm not saying our team was at its maximum strength tonight but it was for what we had available."
The third quarter was where the match was won. After trailing by 17 points at the main break, the Eagles were soon blown away when they failed to score for just over a term of football.
In response, the Bombers piled on seven goals from six individual goal kickers.
Worsfold defended his team's mechanisms to defend quick turnarounds, but said he was disappointed with the players' reaction to the third goal - Stuart Crameri's second for the night at the five-minute mark - and the effort that followed.
"It has to be a mental failure. It has to be not really being switched on to what they were meant to be doing at that time," he said.
"It came in pretty quick early on, and they scored. You have little runs like that and it's hard to say why, we're a pretty good defensive side and we rate our key backs at doing the job.
"It went in there and they scored really quickly four or five times and that was the game, really, there and then.
"In that seven to eight minute period, they put the game out of reach."
Worsfold said they would learn from the defeat and take what they needed to ensure they became a unit that could be rated along with the two teams that have set the pace over the last few years, Collingwood and Geelong.
"We didn't play good footy... We'll work it out. Are we now a team that can't play against the Essendons? Or is that just tonight?" he said.
"History would say we're better than what we played tonight but we have to be prepared to do the work to become better."
The views in this article are those of the author and not necessarily those of the AFL or its clubs.
