GOLD Coast coach Stuart Dew has promised he'll leave no stone unturned to find out how and why the Suns were belted by 80 points by West Coast on Saturday night.
A week after a hard-fought loss to Fremantle, the wheels fell off in the Suns' second consecutive game at Optus Stadium.
They fell 54 points behind by half-time, rallied to win the third term but were swamped again in the last quarter.
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"I was really disappointed with that game. We gave a side a head-start again and started to play safe, so a bit of a theme from last week," Dew said.
"Second quarter, 12 scoring shots from 18 inside 50s is not the way we want to play, so we challenged the lads at half-time. I thought they responded in the third but obviously the last quarter we didn't play the game out either.
"I think we need to be honest about the performance, what was infectious in the first two rounds was infectious in the wrong way today.
"Scores from turnovers was nearly 10 goals, which has been a strength of ours and (we have) much to improve on, much to learn from.”
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Dew refused to blame the 10-day stay in Perth, the hostile Eagles crowd of more than 51,000 or even a lack of hardness in the contest.
"It's a great atmosphere … obviously the crowd went up a little bit but that's not the reason we won or lost today … (and) staying here wasn't going to be why we won or lost the game, there's certainly no excuse there," he said.
"We had a good week on the track, we thought we had a good look at the game last week and learnt some lessons, we just didn't implement tonight, that’s the disappointing part."
He pinpointed the Eagles' ability to dominate on the outside and the Suns' sporadic work rate on transition for the big margin.
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"I thought we ebbed and flowed in contested ball, we were minus eight for the game so I thought we matched them in parts," Dew said.
"I thought where they got us was on the outside. It was a low tackling game overall which is a credit to West Coast and the way they moved the ball.
"We were a real mixed bag in (transition). I thought we had some guys that absolutely tried so hard for the team in transition and then we had some guys who made some choices.
"We'll assess this tape pretty strongly now, obviously two losses in a row so we want to maintain high standards and reward those who do it."
Dew said co-captain Tom Lynch rolled his ankle in the third term but expected him to recover in time for next Sunday's QClash at the Gabba.
He batted away questions about selections or whether Michael Barlow would come in, but conceded the axe may fall.
"It's early to say but I think our NEAFL team played at the same time, so it would be unfair to make that call right now without our match committee and without having talked to the NEAFL coaches," Dew said.
"But obviously when you have a loss like this people put their spot in the side at risk.
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"(Barlow) played in our NEAFL, he played well last week … he's putting pressure on the people in the side, so once we review that game as well we’ll find out where he sits."
Despite the Suns' big loss and Brisbane's 93-point drubbing at the MCG to Richmond earlier in the day, Dew said next week's game would always be exciting in the two-team state.
"I think there's a certain element of excitement regardless of results and form generally doesn't come into it," Dew said.
"It's the first time for me, but what I do know is there will be two footy clubs desperate for four points, so in terms of promoting the game I think we’ll see some desperation from our club and I’m sure Chris Fagan will be talking about the same from Brisbane.
"I think it will be an exciting game, both teams are hungry to win and I think we’ll be head-butting each other for two hours."
