One of Todd's first moves as coach of West Coast was to field almost two different teams: one to play at home in Perth and one to play interstate. While there would be a nucleus of key players for all the matches, Todd declared that he would pick his teams for interstate matches based on who could cope best with the different conditions. The idea seemed reasonable, based on the previous season's results; in their first year of VFL football, of the 11 games the Eagles had won, only two of them were away from home. Todd also perceived that the players had treated the interstate trips as holidays, and so he organized travel arrangements to be as short as possible, with players departing Perth late on Friday and then returning home after the game.