AFL 2021 Round 5: West Coast 103 Collingwood 76

AFL 2021 ROUND 6 COLLINGWOOD v ESSENDON Time & Place:  Sunday April 25, 3.20pm AEST MCG TV: 7mate / Fox Footy Weather: Min 9 Max 16 Chance of rain 9%: 0mm Wind: W 7kph Betting: Collingwood $1.67 West Coast $2.21

West Coast     3.1.19   9.5.59  14.6.90  16.7.103

Collingwood   5.4.34   7.5.47   7.7.49   11.10.76

GOALS - Collingwood: Moore 3, Grundy 2, McCreery 2, Mihocek 2, C Brown, Cameron

BEST - Collingwood: Crisp, Pendlebury, Maynard, Grundy, Moore, Mihocek 

INJURIES - Collingwood: De Goey (facial injury), Howe (hamstring), Mihocek (shoulder)

REPORTS - Collingwood: Nil

SUBSTITUTES - Collingwood: Brayden Sier (replaced Jordan De Goey)

OFFICIAL CROWD - 54,159 at Perth Stadium

What The Pies Coach Said “Some good, and some room for improvement. Ultimately a loss, but the effort was better from the last couple of weeks. The first quarter was excellent. Second quarter we really dropped away and that’s where the game was lost in many ways. We just weren’t able to get on our terms often enough, probably weren’t as clean around the ball as we were early and that hurt us in that second quarter. We were really focused on tonight and finding a better performance and in many ways, in some ways we did, in others, clearly we weren’t good enough tonight, but we’ve got a longer preparation with Essendon and we’ll focus on that.” – Collingwood coach Nathan Buckley

Media Clippings The Australian For one quarter on Friday night it looked like Collingwood had found a way to answer the critics that went hard at Nathan Buckley and his men after their disappointing round four loss to Greater Western Sydney. At quarter-time, in front of the biggest AFL crowd of the season, 54,159 mostly hostile West Coast fans, the Magpies led by 15 points. Buckley pulled the trigger and moved Darcy Moore into attack, leaving out Mason Cox. Moore kicked three goals. Darcy Cameron was brought in to help Brodie Grundy in the ruck. Like they did in last season’s elimination final, the Magpies seemed to have found a way to engineer an upset victory over the Eagles on their home deck at Optus Stadium. But with a point to prove themselves, after their own disappointing performance a week earlier against St Kilda, the Eagles took control.They took advantage of early injuries to Pies pair Jordan de Goey and Jeremy Howe and kicked 13 goals to six after quarter-time to win by 27 points – 16.7 (103) to 11.10 (76). AFL WEST Coast feasted on an injury-hit Collingwood on Friday night, with premiership hero Dom Sheed plunging yet another dagger into the Magpies' hearts in the 27-point win.  At the venue where they had ended the Eagles' season last year, the Magpies were outplayed after quarter-time and slipped to 1-4, losing their third consecutive match, 16.7 (103) to 11.10 (76). With the game at a crossroads late in the third quarter, Sheed stepped in to boot three goals in two minutes and open up a match-winning 41-point lead that proved too much for the Magpies to rein in during a final-quarter rally. The visitors were left counting the cost of the defeat, with star forward Jordan De Goey (face) and important defender Jeremy Howe (hamstring) both injured in the first half. Brody Mihocek also spent part of the final term on the bench icing his shoulder.  Fox Sports West Coast took advantage of another difficult night for recent rivals Collingwood, overcoming early concerns to record a comfortable 27-point win at Optus Stadium. The Eagles (3-2) had no answers in the first term for star Magpies backman Darcy Moore, who spent the entire night up forward, and ruckman Brodie Grundy who combined for three goals before the opening break. But when Jordan De Goey and Jeremy Howe both went off injured, the Eagles flexed their muscle, keeping the Pies (1-4) to just two goals in the middle two quarters. A late blitz got the visitors back within 21 points but in the end a combined 10 goals for Jack Darling and Oscar Allen proved too much to overcome, as West Coast won 16.7 (103) to 11.10 (76). The full-capacity crowd of 54,149 was the largest in the world since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, and the AFL‘s biggest since the 2019 Grand Final.