BILL GETS GRILLED – BILL MONAGHAN ROUND 16 Q & A

WEST Perth premiership coach Bill Monaghan will be conducting a weekly question and answer segment for the club's website. Here he discusses the last Saturday's 49-point win over Perth and looks ahead to this Saturday's clash with Swan Districts at Steel Blue Oval.

QUESTION: Aside from the kicking on goal in the first half, you would have been happy with how you were able to dominate against Perth and play reasonably well probably outside of the last quarter?
ANSWER: Perth rushed five balls through in the first half so that probably makes it better than it looked slightly. I thought our ball movement and pressure and our ability to get the ball in deep, and create scoring opportunities was fantastic and 26 scoring shots in a half is well above average. There was a lot of positives in that and we aren’t going to focus too much on the goalkicking. It's not something that is normal, it's not something that we need to worry too much about and sometimes if you start worrying too much on those things, and focus on them it can actually create more damage than is actually there. We will do our normal amount of goalkicking and we won't specifically focus on it, or mention it and hope it gets back to normal next week.

Q: One positive in front of goal was Michael Lourey kicking three. He has been working hard without the rewards, but good to see him kick more than two in a game for the first time since Round 3?
A: I thought his marking was a lot better. His kicking had been a bit astray, but he was one of the better kicks on goal on the weekend. He looked a lot sharper and we used him through the midfield again in patches, and he's good around the clearances both with his body work and hands. We think he's only going to keep getting better and hopefully with some good players around him, and our forward-line functioning he will just play his role and kick a couple of goals each week. We'll be very happy if he does that.

Q: Another dominant performance was Chris Keunen in the ruck. Does he get the credit he deserves from outside the club?
A: That's hard to judge, but we are rapt to have Chris here. There's been a couple of clubs over the journey who have tried to poach him off us, but he's stayed loyal and he is a really important player for us. On the weekend, we were able to give him a bit of a spell every now and again, and he only played about 85 per cent ground time, which is pretty low for him. That did help him stay sharp around the ground and he was able to find more of the footy than he had been the previous weeks. He's a fantastic player and we expect him to keep performing week in, week out.

Q: Good to see Brayden Antonio get his first league game of the year after having his appendix out earlier in the season?
A: He has been a little bit unlucky for the second year in-a-row because last year because last year he went down injured in the first week or two, and now this year he had his appendix out after playing really well all through the pre-season. But then he had to have four or five weeks off and lost a bit of fitness but his last month in the reserves were outstanding and he thoroughly deserved to get his chance. Whilst he didn’t set the world on fire, I thought he did some good things early and then didn’t have much effect in the first half. He will get better from that and we think he is an extremely talented player, and he deserves to be in the side and we expect him to play a lot of league footy for us.

Q: Always a big game when you play Swan Districts and this Saturday will be no different with them fresh off a bye, and needing to win to stay in the top five?
A: They probably have the added incentive of being disappointed with the last five minutes of the games when we played them here on Anzac Day as well when they coughed up a 26-point lead with five minutes to play. That was highly unusual. They've got a lot of motivation and they are a good side, and have a lot of speed around the ground. They have seasoned players in Notte, Geappen, Ames and Davis who are of good quality and they have some exciting youth as well. We are under no illusions that it's going to be tough, but we enjoy travelling out to Bassendean and we always enjoy playing Swan Districts. There's always a little bit of banter from the crowd and the games generally go down to the wire, which is always exciting.