West Adelaide beat Woodville West-Torrens by seven points in elimination final

WEST Adelaide got a shot of self-belief ahead of this week's clash with minor premier Norwood.

WEST Adelaide got a shot of self-belief ahead of this week's clash with minor premier Norwood with a stirring seven-point win over the Eagles in yesterday's qualifying final.

The Bloods made a whopping 10 changes to the side which lost to the Eagles last week and finished full of running by coming from 27 points down at half time to kick five goals into the breeze in the final term.

But it has come at a cost with inspirational skipper Ryan Ferguson kick-starting their final term with a goal, then being taken to hospital with concussion after a collision with Eagles' Andrew Ainger.

Bad kicking cost the Eagles with the usually reliable Matthew Goldsworthy and Nick Salter both booting 1.4 and seven-goal hero last week Ainger held to 0.3 by Joel Tippett.

Chris Hall kicked four goals - three of them brilliant - but all in the first half as the Eagles' midfield succumbed to the outstanding workrate of Travis Tuck, Ben Macreadie and Chris Schmidt.

West coach Andrew Collins said it was crucial his side took the shortest possible route to the grand final if it was to have a realistic shot at winning the premiership.

"It really is an advantage to get the rest, we saw that with Norwood (last year)," Collins said.

"Norwood had a great run last year with their two straight-sets victories so it's really important we give everything to that game next week "A campaign requires normally 27-28 players, the shorter the campaign is, the less people will get hurt and injured."

Collins conceded his team was "totally out-played" in the first half and gave away too many free kicks and 25m penalties.

"But once we addressed that and changed our structure a bit (we) energised the game," he said.

Eagles coach Michael Godden said his team had the wrong mindset after half time and it must be addressed before the weekend's do-or-die semi final against North Adelaide.

"Firstly goal kicking, I don't know how many more shots we had but I felt we controlled the game so the positive is we're a footy team that's good enough to go deeper (into the finals)," Godden said.

"But the negative is when the game was there to be won in the third quarter, we were pathetic. We went away from our game structure and didn't execute.

"It's not lost in the last 10 minutes, it's lost in the 10 minutes at the start of the third when we just didn't do anything."

Campbell Heath and Patrick Giuffreda were really solid at half back and Angus Poole, Luke Jarrad and Luke Powell had their moments but needed help.

The Eagles took an unlikely lead into quarter time against the breeze, then Poole extended the advantage with two goals in two minutes.

But West Adelaide hit back after half time, starting by winning the clearances and kicking four goals in eight minutes - including a Ferguson miracle from the boundary line.

Ferguson's goal to start the last quarter continued to spark the Bloods but minutes later he was knocked out and stretchered off.

It seemed to lift his side and goals to best-afield Tuck and Tyson Slattery sealed the win.

WEST ADELAIDE 2.1 3.4 9.4 14.5 (89) defeated EAGLES 2.3 7.7 8.12 11.16 (82)

BEST - West: Tuck, Macreadie, Mangan, Schmidt, Slattery, Tippett, Fielke. Eagles: Heath, Poole, Giuffreda, Powell, Jarrad, Hall.

GOALS - West: Tuck 3; Bonney, Ferguson, Slattery 2; Hill, Fielke, Bricknell, Beech, Hartlett. Eagles: Hall 4; Poole 3; Powell, Salter, Goldsworthy, Heath.

INJURIES - West: Moran (hamstring), Ferguson (concussion).

UMPIRES - T. Philip, T. Medlin, A. Crosby.