A bruised and battered West Coast will draw on its best win of the season, a six-goal victory over Fremantle in round six, to regroup for next Saturday’s western derby at Optus Stadium.

The Eagles limped out of Melbourne last night on the heels of a 72-point defeat by St Kilda, but interim coach Jarrad Schofield said they would likely welcome back key forward Jake Waterman and midfield talisman Elliot Yeo from injury.

“You have got to leverage a little about how well you played last time and that is how we go about our football,” Schofield said.

“If we go back to that game, we saw our identity that we are chasing … and that’s why we won the game of football.

“But we are inconsistent with that at the moment and we get an opportunity to get back to it.” Schofield won’t be asking tyro Harley Reid to rein in his combative nature after a 19-disposal effort against the Saints that was laced with heated physical and verbal battles with St Kilda players.

“He is a young man, he is 19 years of age, there is a lot of hype around him,” Schofield said.

“I don’t think there are too many 19-year-olds who have had that much hype.

“Teams are going to put work into him, but he is combative and we want him to be combative.

“It’s all about controlled aggression to make sure he stays on task and executes his role for us in the team.

“So that’s what we look at rather than more so than how he’s being too aggressive or getting distracted.

“It’s more about his role. Let’s not forget he’s still 19 years of ago and he is still finding his way in this AFL game.

“The fact that he goes at the game is what we are looking for and that’s what he brings, he brings that excitement, he brings others into the game. He’s a linebreaker. So the more we can encourage that of Harley the better we’ll be as a team.”

Schofield would not comment on an incident in the second quarter which will face match review scrutiny in which West Coast forward Liam Ryan caught St Kilda’s Liam Stocker high.

“To be honest I can’t comment. I had so much going on in the game, I didn’t focus on that,” he said.

St Kilda won the inside 50 count 67-37, an imbalance that was always going to hurt the Eagles.

“The numbers were really stacked against us early on, in the first 15 minutes of the game,” he said.

“Trying to build the ball up from deep in our back half there was always going to come a time when the dam wall was going to break.

“Unfortunately today all the things that we planned for we didn’t execute.

“In the end, we are disappointed, especially in that second half.”

Schofield said the team did not hit any of the metrics they aimed for.

“Not today we didn’t,” he said.

“My messaging as a caretaker coach has been pretty simple. We want to get better each week.

“What that looks like and the outcome will take care of itself and today we didn’t execute a lot of the things we are focusing on around our identity as a football team.”

Meanwhile, Schofield would not be drawn on whether he would put his hand up for the coaching job full-time, with the race now wide open after the withdrawal of early favourite Dean Cox.

“I think I said before the game I am just focusing on week to week, how I can execute my role as the caretaker coach to hopefully be a part of us getting better as a football club,” he said.

“But right now my focus is on today’s game, my focus will be on the review and we’ll put our sights on Freo, which is a great opportunity for our guys to go to work in a derby.

“We have to make sure we respond in a way we are bringing energy into our training, learn from this game, and continue to get better.”