West Coast captain Oscar Allen has gone into bat for coach Adam Simpson following a deplorable outing against Hawthorn on Sunday.
Fielding "on paper, the best side we had so far this year" thanks to the returns of Harley Reid (suspension) and Tim Kelly (groin), the Eagles set themselves to take down the in-form Hawks in front of a home crowd at Optus Stadium.
How wrong they'd be.
From start to finish, the hosts were outplayed, suffering their fifth consecutive loss and taking a step backwards in their development.
Amid a tumultuous time in the club's history, questions over whether Simpson is the right man for the job, seeing finishes of 18th and 17th over the past two campaigns, have arisen, which has prompted Allen to leap to his defence.
"The group is completely behind Simmo," Allen said on Tuesday.
"As a leader of the group, it wasn't acceptable.
"We are clearly frustrated and we understand that fans are as well and we are owning that.
"We need to get back to work and get better, we have a game in five days and everyone in these four walls has Simmo's back.
"Us as the players we need to own that, Simmo works as hard as anyone to make sure we have prepared as well as possible and to execute the game plan and for us to be unable to do that, the 23 on the weekend own that and it's a massive responsibility for us to make amends for it this weekend."
Allen - who joined the captain ranks alongside Liam Duggan ahead of 2024 - has alluded to what the Eagles will focus on ahead of their clash with Melbourne, a side they knocked off seven weeks ago.
"The response is how we can play our brand of footy," the 24-year-old continued.
"How can we get us all performing the best that we can. Our brand is focussing on our contest, pressure and playing front half footy and at the moment it is a little aspirational.
"The gap between our worst and our best is too far and until we can minimise that gap we are not going to be a consistently competitive side."
Allen's return to the senior side has been a welcome sight for West Coast fans after a dominant 2023 season resulting in 53 goals.
A knee injury in Round 1 hampered his start to the year, sidelining the right-footer for three months.
Thrown straight into the deep end against Essendon a fortnight ago, Allen was once again emphatic in his defence with how the Eagles governed his recovery program, despite a lowly performance on the weekend.
"I'm really happy with how (the club managed me)," Allen said.
"The strength and conditioning side of things did an exemplary job... (our list) is really healthy and put all players through every rigour possible.
"For me to be able to get through the last two weeks but also play really high game time... obviously I was a little bit rusty against Essendon and then on the weekend, I was one of a number of players who didn't perform at the level.
"I'm taking full onus and responsibility on that but it's got nothing to do with the football club, the coaches, match committee or the strength and conditioning staff. They've done everything they can to allow me to play."
