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The West Coast Eagles have enjoyed one of the most comfortable preliminary final wins in living memory after thumping the Melbourne Demons by 66 points at Optus Stadium in Perth.
The temptation was to write the simplest and most succinct match report of all time and summarise the action into one line: they smashed ’em!
To do so would be disrespectful to the entire season that the Demons put together and the embarrassment of today wasn’t what any football fan was hoping for leading into the game.
The match was a one-way street from beginning to end. Without a goal in the first term, the Demons had slumped to a 29-point deficit by the first change. Their work by foot was poor and the less said about the efficiency of their handballs the better.
The Eagles were close to perfect, capitalising on any Melbourne errors and hitting the scoreboard as a result.
If anyone thought the second quarter might prove a leveller, how wrong they were to be and the Eagles took a 63-point lead into the long break with the Demons still yet to find a goal.
The second half was a much tighter affair yet it meant nothing in the context of the entire game. Bravely battling away late in the game means little after a team fails to find the ball when it really matters.
Melbourne did manage to finds numerous goals in the third quarter, yet the Eagles didn’t stop scoring and still held a 61-point lead at the final change.
The fourth term was nothing more than a party for the fans. The noise was enormous and tickets for next weekend became the dominant thought of the members.
In the end it was a 66-point margin for a side that will enter the grand final with confidence equal to that of Collingwood.
Both clubs have produced the stunning on preliminary final weekend and should be commended for their efforts.
Mark Le Cras, Josh Kennedy and Jack Darling were the attacking winners for the Eagles on the day yet the job done in the midfield was also astonishing.
The Melbourne run was countered and with Jeremy McGovern sweeping across the back, the Demons never really found an answer to the game plan of Adam Simpson.
The most telling example of that was the complete absence of Max Gawn for much of the contest. Simpson set about engaging him in contests as often as possible, in order to prevent the ruckman helping out across half back by taking uncontested marks.
It worked a treat and the Eagles are off to the grand final to face the Magpies. It will undoubtedly be closer than today’s game.
The Demons will live to fight another day, next season, but today was all about the West Coast Eagles.