ADAM Simpson got the response he wanted as West Coast bounced back from the big loss to Hawthorn, but he is a long way from being satisfied with the progress of the premiership fancy.
Simpson admitted the 46-point belting at the MCG by Hawthorn last Sunday had hurt the club and cast a shadow over the lead-up to Western Derby 43.
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However, the Eagles’ 33-point victory over Fremantle at the ‘home' derby ticked plenty of boxes for the Eagles coach.
"The maturity of our leaders, I think they responded pretty well during the week, trained well," Simpson said.
"There's always question marks early in the year about where you're at.
WATCH: Adam Simpson's full post match media conference
"We are still not where we want to be.
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"But to play like that tonight, the way we did it, that was really pleasing but I'm not getting carried away."
Ross Glendinning medallist Matt Priddis admitted he did a rain dance on the morning of the game and said the grinding slog in the wet against dour Fremantle had provided the perfect chance for the Eagles to redeem themselves after being crunched in tight by the Hawks.
"It (the Hawthorn game) was as disappointing effort as we'd put in as a playing group so (the week) was pretty quiet," Priddis said.
"We all just had to get back to making sure we trained well, prepared the best we could to come out and get back to playing good team footy.
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"We were really disappointing last week and it hurt the boys a lot."
Simpson said it was hard to tell how far the Eagles (2-1) had come since surging in 2015 to make the Grand Final.
"It's hard to tell, every week is different," Simpson said.
"Every game presents something a little bit different so we've had three really different games (against the Brisbane Lions, Hawthorn and Fremantle).
"I think for the most part we've carried ourselves pretty well but last week we were really disappointed so now we are looking for the consistency, we've got to really back it up."
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Former rookie-lister turned 2014 Brownlow medallist Priddis shone in his 200th match with 31 possessions. He said it was a dream to reach the milestone.
"I'm so proud and honoured to play for this footy club, they helped to realise my childhood dream. I'm really grateful for that and hopefully we are building towards something special."