West Coast coach Daisy Pearce praises superstar Ella Roberts after first-term heroics for Eagles
Debutant Lucia Painter's three-goal third quarter might have stunned the football world, but the Eagles' 5.5 (35) to 2.8 (20) victory at Mineral Resources Park was set up by Roberts.
The incredible 20-year-old who already has a club champion and All-Australian honour to her name kicked two goals from 11 touches in a blistering first term, before finishing with 24 disposals.
Pearce described Roberts as an 'incredible talent' who had begun to tap into her potential as she gained the understanding to be a professional athlete.
'It's a good day as a coach when Ella Roberts starts the game that way,' she said.
'She's an incredible talent Ella and we saw today that she'll be able to sustain that high level for longer periods of time now because another one that's starting to put all the pieces in place around her talent which is her hard work and diligence off field.
'It was good to see her start the game that way. She had a really good third quarter as well without her finishing the work. I thought her work-rate and intensity around the ball was one of those reasons why we were getting the deep entries that allowed Lu to go to work. To have those two now to be able to work in tandem as mid-forwards is going to be a good lever to be able to pull.'
Remarkably, Roberts had a disrupted lead into round one, battling a back injury weeks into the season.
'That was set up by the work that she did early in the off-season,' Pearce said.
'She was a really consistent trainer. I suspected it would. She got a bit of reward last year with external recognition with some of the individual awards that she won.
'It kind of kicked her into gear to go 'I want to be better'. She's been working hard for a long time. A little bit interrupted towards the back end with her back but given she'd done so much work early it didn't affect her too much.'
There is also seemingly no ceiling on how good Roberts could be and Pearce said if she wasn't already one of the best players in the AFLW she soon would be.
'The beauty of her is she just loves getting out there and playing footy. She's 20 years old; she got a lot of talent, she loves getting around her teammates and she's a good teammate,' she said.
'I think she's halfway there, if she's not already there. And given the work that she's putting in and her increasing understanding of what it takes to be a professional athlete, it's pretty exciting where her ceiling is.'
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