West Coast coach Andrew McQualter has defended the decision to hand debutant Sandy Brock the task of facing Coleman medallist Jesse Hogan and even said AFL great Stephen Silvagni couldn’t stop the Greater Western Sydney spearhead.

Hogan kicked an equal career-high nine goals as the Giants massacred the Eagles by 81 points at ENGIE Stadium on Sunday, with first-gamer Brock left one-out against the experienced forward for the entire game.

The Eagles made the extraordinary decision to drop 200cm full back Harry Edwards for the clash despite five-time All-Australian Jeremy McGovern being sidelined with a groin injury and the loss of Tom Barrass to Hawthorn in last year’s trade period.

It left Brock to battle Hogan, who took 10 marks and kicked nine goals to lead the premiership contenders to a convincing 20.12 (132) to 7.9 (51) victory.

McQualter conceded Hogan and the Giants were too good for his young Eagles on the day.

“He took about six contested marks. It’s an easy one to say now I suppose but I actually thought — this is going to sound crazy — Sandy Brock defended quite well and showed some moments,” he said.

“Their class, their supply and his talent was just a bit too much for us at times.”

Asked about the decision to leave Edwards out of the side, McQualter said he wanted more run out of defence, while he pointed to the lack of other aerial threats in the Giants’ forward line outside of Hogan.

“Statistically they’re not aerially the biggest threat in the league, as much as Jesse Hogan is, that hasn’t been a theme for them overall for the whole season,” he said.

“We wanted to create a bit more offence in our back half as well. We’ve been stuck a fair bit in the back half.

“I’ve spoken about this a few times, we don’t know where our team is going to finish up when we hit our straps. We’re going to be exploring some things and it’s a fine balance between settling our players and trying to find our best team as well.”

McQualter said the Eagles would wrap their arms around 22-year-old Brock who had the toughest of AFL initiations.

“We’ll support him. We’ll go back and look at the tape, I’m sure Sandy hasn’t got everything right,” he said.

“Ultimately when you have that ease with your flow of ball through the middle of the ground, you could put Stephen Silvagni in the backline and he (Hogan) still would’ve kicked a few today.”

McQualter also decided against sending co-captain Oscar Allen back into defence until late in the clash, a move he pulled in last weekend’s western derby and hadn’t ruled out repeating in the future.

“The Giants are one of the best intercept marking teams in the competition particularly Sam Taylor, so we actually gave Oscar the role on Sam Taylor today,” he said.

“I thought he competed really well. It was a step in the right direction.

“I know he probably didn’t hit the scoreboard like he would’ve liked but that was just a choice we made going into this game.”