The West Coast Eagles added a blend of speed, agility, endurance and skill with their two selections to complete the Club\u2019s 2025 national draft haul on Thursday night.<\/p>\n
With their first pick in the second round, selection No.29 overall, the Eagles swooped on hard-running wingman Sam Allen, adding to their all-Victorian flavour from the opening night of the draft.<\/p>\n
An elite runner who clocked a sub six-minute 2km time trial pre-season, Allen started the Coates Talent League campaign strongly – averaging 21.3 disposals across the first three rounds – before suffering a season-ending ACL setback at training.<\/p>\n
Capable of playing half-forward or inside midfield, the 182cm Oakleigh Chargers product looms as an exciting addition to the Eagles\u2019 list.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe were rapt to land Sam with our first pick of the second night and add his elite running ability to our mix,\u201d National Recruiting Manager Duane Massey said.<\/p>\n
\u201cSam ran an outstanding 5.47 time trial earlier in the season before suffering his ACL injury in one of the early training sessions for Vic Metro.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s also an excellent overhead mark, he can play across half-forward and is a real pro who has attacked his rehab in outstanding fashion.\u201d<\/p>\n
West Coast also matched a bid from Fremantle at pick 39 on Naitanui Academy product Tylah Williams from Swan Districts via Tambellup.<\/p>\n
Williams was one of the leading West Australian prospects in 2025, with the electric small forward shooting higher up draft calculations following a sizzling draft combine showcasing his speed and agility.<\/p>\n
\u201cReally pleased to match a bid on Tylah. He\u2019s come through our academy and progressed nicely in 2025 playing state 18s for WA and League footy for our WAFL team,\u201d Massey said<\/p>\n
\u201cHis speed, lateral movement and forward pressure will be exciting to watch as he develops in our system.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Eagles shifted back from pick 34 to selection 52 in a trade with Hawthorn to prepare to match a bid for Williams, while also picking up a 2026 third-round selection and 2027 third-rounder \u2013 both tied to the Hawks.<\/p>\n
West Coast opted not to match Brisbane\u2019s bid for Academy product Koby Evans at selection 38 \u2013 one selection before matching for Williams \u2013 and father-son Charlie Banfield went to St Kilda at pick 41.<\/p>\n
The Eagles could not match the bid for Banfield due to not having an available list spot after selecting Allen and Williams earlier in the draft.<\/p>\n
\u201cBased on our talent order we prioritised drafting Tylah, and while we hoped Koby and Charlie would be available as rookies for us to select on Friday it wasn\u2019t to be. Albeit we are really pleased for them that they are on AFL lists,\u201d Head of List Management and Recruiting Matt Clarke said.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is great for our Academy program to have those players realise their AFL dreams and we wish them all the best for their future careers.\u201d<\/p>\n
After selecting versatile gun Willem Duursma with pick one overall, ruck-forward Cooper Duff-Tytler and elite kicking wing\/defender Josh Lindsay in the first round, West Coast rounded out the national draft with a midfielder and speedy small forward.<\/p>\n
The Eagles will consider their options overnight ahead of Friday\u2019s rookie draft from 3pm AEDT (12pm AWST).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The West Coast Eagles added a blend of speed, agility, endurance and skill with their two selections to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":297182,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[43,44,83,41,39,42,40],"class_list":{"0":"post-297181","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-headlines","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-text","11":"tag-top-news","12":"tag-top-stories","13":"tag-topnews","14":"tag-topstories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/297181","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=297181"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/297181\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/297182"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=297181"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=297181"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=297181"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}