ADAM Simpson says people would be "jumping the gun" by suggesting West Coast will finish in the top four, but finals remains the aim for his young side.
The Eagles took another step forward towards a September berth with a 56-point win over Geelong at Domain Stadium on Sunday afternoon.
It was the Eagles' sixth-straight win and they remain in second spot on the ladder with the best percentage in the competition.
But Simpson scoffed at the suggestion his side could finish in the top four.
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"I think you're jumping the gun there," Simpson said.
"We wanted to improve off last year. That was our number one goal.
"Our goal from the start was to improve and we finished ninth last year.
"So we want to play finals if we can. Playing a brand that we think stands up in bigger games is what we're striving for and today was another small step towards that.
"But we've got North Melbourne in Tasmania next week and that will be another massive challenge."
WATCH: Adam Simpson's full post-match media conference
West Coast will head to Hobart next Sunday full of confidence to face a Kangaroos side bereft of it after losing to Collingwood on Sunday afternoon.
The Eagles continued their trend of dominating the second half as they booted 12 goals to Geelong's four after the main break.
They have lost just two second-half quarters for the season and have not lost a third quarter, kicking 50 goals to 19 across the first nine games.
"I'm not going to declare we're the fittest in the comp or we play for second halves at all," Simpson said.
"Look, I can't really put a finger on it to be honest. They've now got confidence, though, that coming into the second half we can actually go to another level and we've got naturally fit players that are playing to their strengths.
"I won't say it's planned."
Simpson was pleased that his side was able to overcome some horrendous kicking for goal in Sunday's win. The Eagles kicked 16.24 for the match, but had 4.17 on the board at half-time to keep Geelong in the contest.
Inaccurate goalkicking cost the Eagles four games last year and although Simpson was agitated at times during the match he was pleased with the overall performance.
"It's frustrating but I wasn't as frustrated as I have been in the past," Simpson said.
"I think we were doing a lot of good things, a lot of things right and we just couldn't finish off.
"You always feel the sense we've missed an opportunity because momentum shifts happen all the time and we didn't make the most of our momentum.
"We spoke about that half-time. Like I said, it happened a few times last year and we didn't make the most of it. We can't keep missing shots like that. I think we had 10 inside 50s for 1.9 at one stage.
"But I think the weight of numbers in the end will keep me reasonably comfortable."
