Port Adelaide captain Travis Boak has warned the club will be honest ahead of Showdown

PORT Adelaide captain Travis Boak has warned there will be a scathing and honest review as the Power comes to grips with their loss to West Coast and prepare for Saturday’s Showdown.

Andrew Gaff of the Eagles looks to break a tackle by Travis Boak of the Power.

PORT Adelaide captain Travis Boak has warned there will be a scathing and brutally honest review as the Power comes to grips with their heavy loss to West Coast and prepare for Saturday’s Showdown.

Boak, who was among the Power’s best players in Western Australia, was fuming about the team’s inability to win the ball — which resulted in a -42 contested ball count.

But he was also quick to single out himself and the senior players for failing to react when the Eagles were belting Port Adelaide on the quick and hard surface of the new Perth Stadium.

No punches will be held as a review begins on Monday.

Andrew Gaff of the Eagles looks to break a tackle by Travis Boak of the Power.

“We’ve got to recognise where we need to get better and be ruthless on that,” Boak said. “There’s no doubt about that.

“We’ve got to be honest with each other and talk about where we need to improve.

“That’s what we do this week.

“We’ll do that Monday; we’ll do that Tuesday.

“We look forward to the Showdown but we’ve got some areas we’ve got to improve on and be consistent.”

There were some positives in the loss to the Eagles, not least the comeback that threatened to blow life into the game after the Power had been belted for two and a half quarters.

But the third-quarter comeback was too little and too late and not at the front of Boak’s mind when assessing the game.

“We showed last week (in the North Melbourne win) that we can do it; now it’s about making sure that we’re consistent with it,” Boak said. “Momentum’s a big thing in footy and when they had it they made the most of it.

“We’ve got to recognise and make sure our senior players stand up during that period and get on top of the area that were letting us down, which was the contested ball.

“It was probably really only a patch in the third quarter that was good.”

Boak singled out contested ball as the main culprit in the loss, much like coach Ken Hinkley did post match.

But he noted that the capacity to win the hard ball was there in spurts; the challenge now is to do it for the game.

“The main thing was contested ball; we got absolutely smashed in that and when we did play our best footy we were able to win in the contest.

“That’s the big thing out of the game — we just can’t get smashed in the contest like that.

“We’ve got to give ourselves a chance of kicking a score by winning the contest and getting forward.

“We had patches when we did but as a group we have to stand up and recognise it out on the ground when it doesn’t happen.”