Something is clearly wrong at East Perth

[Hamburger]

Another hiding today. 0 and 5. In all of these games EP has had many more kicks, mark and handballs than the opposition.
Players dropped from the Eagles go back and have a field day....this week Hutchings and Jetta, last week Sheed but it does not translate into the scoreboard ticking over. Why not?
Players who were playing well also have their numbers drop off when others come back in from the Eagles. This week Partington and Mutimer and also Sheed.
Others such as Lamb appear to be going backwards rapidly.
I was all in favour of the alignment because it seemed to make sense to have all the youngsters playing and learning together but now have serious doubts it is actually providing any benefit at all to our developing players.

[Crazy Dazz]

Te downside of the Alliance is that it is very difficult for EP to develop our own players. Guys leave for better opportunity, retirees are not replaced, and we're banned from external recruiting. Ironically the couple of blokes we have managed to hang onto, McGinnity and Maguiness, are both mids.

The nature of the current Eagles squad, and their recruiting over recent seasons, means that EP are loaded with "developing" mids and not much else. Tey get a lot of the footy but don't use it effectively and there are no targets or even link-ups.

Theres also the problem that so many of the players on the Eagles list are just plain crap. All they are doing at EP is thieving oxygen and stopping our own players getting a run.
Apart from NN, Jones is probably the best ruck in the combined squads, yet he'd be playing Ressies if the Eagles didn't have so many injuries. Eagles recruiting has been sub-par for a long time, often abysmally so, and they compound the problem by hanging onto to crabs, but its EP that suffers.

Te Eagles knew when they recruited Lamb that he was talented but suffered from motivational issues. It was evident last year that he had lost the desire.