Round 11 | Bolton Underlines Sandover Credentials in West Coast Walkover

By John Townsend

Jye Bolton has a message for Bailey Rogers: “Anything you can do, I can do better”.

When West Coast visited Revo Fitness Stadium in round 4, Rogers underlined his Sandover Medal-winning class with a dominant display that set up Claremont’s biggest score and biggest win since their 2012 premiership season.

The score and win over the beleaguered Eagles wasn’t quite as big on Saturday – the margin was 91 not 111 points and the score 22.15 (147) to 8.8 (56) rather than 23.16 (154) to 6.7 (43), but Bolton towered over the match just as Rogers did in April.

If Bolton wins his third Sandover this season, and that cause will surely be aided by the three votes on Saturday, he can point to the emergence of a new Claremont midfield brigade for the highly successful change in his role.

Bolton started at half-back against West Coast and while he had the odd stint in the middle late in the game to keep his hand in, his greatest impact came from his ability to read the play from behind the ball, get into position to receive or deliver the football, and then do so with precision, pace and depth.

Bolton got his hands on the football 43 times in the game, hit team-mates with most of those possessions, and underlined emphatically his status as the most influential WAFL player of the decade.

While Bolton and fellow defender Teia Miles controlled the backline, and captain Declan Mountford, muscular Ben Elliott and lively Callan England relished their plentiful midfield opportunities, Claremont were also well-served by their mosquito fleet of deadly small forwards that stretched and exposed West Coast’s defence.

Talon Delacey and Anthony Treacy produced career-best four-goal games, and Tyron Smallwood and Zac Mainwaring also landed multiple strikes as Claremont extended their lead at every break and had an eight-goal spree into the stiff breeze in the third term.

Each of that quartet was on the board before time-on in the first quarter while major target Alex Manuel and debutant Max Mumme, the grandson of Claremont’s 1964 premiership captain Les, soon added to the barrage.

Treacy had a breakthrough game after a career that has included time in Sydney’s academy and West Coast rookie list, and been notable for a series of promising rather than imposing performances.

Former captain Ian Richardson saw something special in the Broome local when he gifted him his No.4 guernsey three years ago and Treacy lived up to those expectations with a brilliant display that saw him regularly trek into defence to provide support before racing forward to offer an attacking option.

He has set a high bar for the rest of the season.

Miles has been building steadily after joining the club where his father Geoff was a premiership player.

The defender had 35 possessions of his own, though his vibrant rebounding was enhanced by his other specialist role as an interceptor, which meant that many of West Coast’s 38 forward 50 entries were cut off before they could do any damage.

Claremont were dragged down to West Coast’s level at various times, with their opponent’s average losing margin of exactly 100 points suggesting why they were eager to clog up the match for long periods, but there were enough shining lights to predict a bright end to the season.

Rogers will return from an ankle injury next week, fellow State midfielder Ben Edwards is not far off, and Jason Carter and Declan Hardisty are due back in the coming weeks.

The only sour note came when Max Minear was reported for a front-on bump on Ethan Sambo but given that the WAFL match review panel dismissed identical, if not more forceful, incidents involving Peel’s Brady Grey on Bolton and Subiaco’s Galen Savigni on West Perth mid Mitch Peirce, the forward should have no case to answer.

CLAREMONT 6.2 9.6 17.10 22.15 147

WEST COAST 1.4 3.4 6.6 8.8 56

GOALS – CLAREMONT: Treacy, Delacey 4; Smallwood 3; England, Elliott, Manuel, Mainwaring 2; O’Connor, Western, Mumme.

WEST COAST: Burke 3; Nitschke 2; Barnett, Nelson, Lucassen.

BEST – CLAREMONT: Bolton, Miles, Treacy, Mountford, Elliott, Eastland, Delacey.

WEST COAST: Trew, Nelson, Burke, Mercer.