Sloane Signals Hill as West Coast’s New Mythical Creature

AFL legend Rory Sloane has voiced support for the West Coast Eagles’ interest in former Collingwood star Bobby Hill, a move insiders describe as more a summoning than a simple recruitment.

The wind in Perth is doing that thing again – the kind that sounds like a bag of old footballs being shaken in a tin shed – and it turned out to be Sloane, an AFL legend by any metric that doesn’t involve checking a pulse, throwing his weight behind West Coast’s interest in Hill.

Sloane, whose name carries the gravitational pull of a black hole but with better branding, didn’t use the word “recruit.” He used “interest.” In AFL, “interest” is a polite way of saying “we have opened the file and the coffee is still warm.” For West Coast, whose recent history can be charted by the number of times they’ve almost had someone, this is a significant heat spike.

Bobby Hill, formerly of Collingwood, is a player whose presence could be described as a force of nature – complete with a jersey number that seems to glow in the Perth gloom. The idea that he might suit the West Coast setup feels less a sporting decision and more a geological event. Collingwood may have lost a star, but they kept the ghost, which is often more valuable than the body.

The Eagles are known for their long‑suffering, a trait usually reserved for saints or people who have been waiting at a bus stop in the rain for forty years. Backing a legend’s interest is a statement of hope, which in Perth is treated with the same suspicion as a free lunch in Melbourne.

Sloane’s endorsement is the equivalent of a captain blowing the whistle before the game has started. It suggests the game is already over, or perhaps that time has stopped while everyone waits for Hill to decide if he wants to stand up. The former Collingwood star’s availability remains a topic of intrigue for the Eagles.