John Worsfold may have just become the first man in almost 30 years to both captain and coach the same club to an AFL premiership but his thoughts were with his
John Worsfold may have just become the first man in almost 30 years to both captain and coach the same club to an AFL premiership but his thoughts were with his players after he steered the Eagles to their first flag in 12 years on Saturday.Worsfold became the first man since David Parkin at Hawthorn in 1978 to both captain and then later coach the same club to premiership success after he held aloft the Eagles' only two other premiership cups to date in 1992 and 1994 with Mick Malthouse as coach.But his first thoughts on Saturday were with his players and in particular the man who was standing alongside him holding up the cup on Saturday after the thrilling one point win over Sydney in captain Chris Judd."I am thrilled for champion players like Chris and Ben Cousins that they have become premiership players and it's a great reward for them," Worsfold said.After the pain of last year's four point loss to Sydney in the Grand Final, Worsfold said he felt a sense of satisfaction rather than relief that the Eagles were able to withstand a determined Sydney fightback after half-time to prevail by the narrowest possible margin this year."There is satisfaction that all the work we have put in during the year paid off," he said."We have been questioned at times, but we showed a lot of honesty (throughout the year).""I had no doubt that the players put in the work required to win a premiership."Worsfold in particular felt a sense of pride for the way his team had overcome its much-publicised forward problems of a couple of years ago to win a flag."Everyone said our forward line was dysfunctional but we kept working hard (on improving the attack)," he said.It has taken just five years for Worsfold to turn the Eagles from a team that was in the bottom four in 2001 to a premiership side but admitted he was never sure how long it would take to achieve success when he took over from Ken Judge for the 2002 season."You can never put a timeline on these things because of the system we work under with the draft and the salary cap," he said."I just wanted to give the players the chance to improve and build a good team and then once we did that, I wanted to give them the opportunity to win a flag."Worsfold said the biggest lesson he had learned during his five years as coach of the Eagles was to just "keep learning.""You can't look at wins through rose-coloured glasses, you have to keep looking at ways to improve," he said.Worsfold also thanked everyone at West Coast for helping the club to achieve the ultimate success on Saturday."I have had unbelievable support from the board," he said."They have pushed our professional development and spared no cost (in helping the club to win a premiership)."
