One of Australia’s most experienced and respected football writers joins thewest.com.au for the 2017 finals. Check back every Monday afternoon for his latest thoughts on the state of the competition.

Credit where it’s due. West Coast has copped plenty of flak throughout this AFL season, most of it justified, but the bottom line is the Eagles have made finals for a third year in a row, something they hadn’t achieved for a decade.

To get there, they had to not only knock over the best-performed side of the season, but do so by enough to edge ahead of Melbourne on percentage, something that was still not the case when Charlie Cameron brought Adelaide closer with only a few minutes left on Sunday.

Those last few minutes saw West Coast display enough strength of character to make the difference, a trait which at times in 2017, has been sadly lacking.

Is that in itself enough? Of course not. This is a team which less than two seasons ago played off for a premiership. Limping into eighth spot now is far from what was expected of a side which, though soundly beaten on grand final day in 2015, had plenty of reason to believe that its best was still ahead.

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West Coast will go into the elimination final against Port Adelaide on Saturday week a $51 outsider to win the flag. Few in the football world give the Eagles much chance, if any, of going beyond the semi-finals.

And yet, when it clicks, as it did against the Crows on Sunday, West Coast is capable of upsetting even the best. Which puts coach Adam Simpson and his brains trust in an interesting position.

Recent retirement announcements by Matt Priddis, Sam Mitchell, Sam Butler and now Drew Petrie have given off more of a feel of a club rebuilding than one shooting for a flag. So where are the Eagles exactly? Do even they know?

Camera Icon Players the likes of Matt Priddis will prove difficult to replace, but not impossible. Credit: Getty Images

West Coast went into this season with the second-oldest and equal most experienced list in the competition. Those retirements will change that substantially, and not necessarily in a negative sense.

While skipper Shannon Hurn, Josh Kennedy and Mark LeCras will start the 2018 season on the wrong side of 30, all are still producing close enough to their best football. Of the Eagles’ core players - the likes of Luke Shuey, Andrew Gaff, Jeremy McGovern, Elliot Yeo, Jack Darling and Jamie Cripps - only Shuey is older than 25.

The foundations of potential success will still be there. Clearly replacing two midfield warhorses in Priddis and Mitchell is a priority, as should finding a good deal more run. But it’s about more than that.

Lewis Jetta’s pivotal role late on Sunday showed how big a difference that leg-speed and defensive pressure can make, but Jetta’s status is in a way reflective of the Eagles as a whole. For he and so many other Eagles, the battle has been psychological as much as physical, far too big a gap between personal bests and worsts.

While much is made of West Coast’s lack of tackling pressure, it’s never been a feature of the Eagles’ game under Simpson, even in 2015, when they ranked last for tackling on the differentials.

They were, however, strong in two other key indicators, ranked first for contested ball and sixth for clearances. Those rankings fell to ninth for each category last year, and this season, a woeful 15th and 17th.

That indicates a selectiveness of effort on too many players’ parts. So this season does the number of times the Eagles have let winning positions slip, and their record away from home. In 2015, West Coast won six and drew another of 11 games on the road. That became 5-5 last season, this year 3-7.

Play Video Mark Duffield and Glen Quartermain assess West Coast's finals chances after their remarkable victory over Adelaide. The West Australian Video Mark Duffield and Glen Quartermain assess West Coast's finals chances after their remarkable victory over Adelaide.

A team strong enough to have made the grand final only two years ago should be improving those numbers with more experience, not to mention the disappointment of letting a premiership chance slip.

Sunday’s effort against Adelaide was a salient reminder about how good West Coast’s best can be when the Eagles are switched on and made of stern enough stuff mentally. It’s a warning that victory, even in an away final in Adelaide, isn’t beyond reach.

But it’s also a reminder of how big a challenge, whatever the result in that game, Simpson has ahead of him in instilling a far more consistently ruthless attitude in his playing group. Because until that happens, West Coast, despite undoubted talent, will still just be making up the numbers.

On Buckley and his new two-year deal

Nathan Buckley would be the first person to admit that in terms of results, he’s lucky to have kept his job as Collingwood coach.

Having famously said on 1116 SEN last year there was “no way” he could hold his position beyond 2017 should the Magpies not make finals, he’s not only survived, but received a two-year extension.

Typically honest, Buckley admitted on Monday that a club review that looked beyond just the coaching position had pretty much saved his bacon, and that the perennially lofty goals Collingwood set were an in issue in itself. “I think in many ways we got our expectations wrong,” he said.

To what extent he is responsible for those expectations, and the list management which saw some spectacular disasters on the recruiting front via Chris Mayne and Daniel Wells, is debatable.

He certainly can’t escape responsibility for an at-times baffling game style, which continually saw Collingwood this year focus on ball retention rather than attack and quick movement. Hopefully, that can be fine-tuned further.

Camera Icon Buckley fronted the media this morning after an intriguing year at the Pies. Credit: Getty Images

What can’t be though, are the shackles of pride, not only a club’s, but its president’s. The millstone that became the much-vaunted handover of the coaching position from Mick Malthouse to Buckley created a millstone which has weighed heavier on Eddie McGuire each passing year.

Were Buckley removed from his post, the admission of defeat would have tainted perceptions of Collingwood for some time, but McGuire’s public legacy for far longer, perhaps permanently.

Collingwood’s internal review has involved a degree of pride swallowing. But not nearly so much as would have been gulped in the event of Buckley’s sacking. And however the next two seasons pan out, it seems clear that pride, both personal and that of an entire club, has played a huge part in his reappointment.