The disappointment of last year is providing fuel to the West Coast Eagles this pre-season, with the group united in their aim to beat top-eight sides in the coming qualifying rounds.

Finishing ninth in 2014, West Coast failed to defeat a team ranked above itself, falling short in agonisingly close matches to the likes of Port Adelaide, Fremantle and Essendon.

In an interview with 6PR, Simpson revealed that the squad has been focusing on basic skills in their bid to climb the ladder this season.

“It’s been interesting with the pre-season, we’ve largely focused on the fundamentals and getting ourselves prepared for a gruelling season,” Simpson said.

“On top of that for us it’s probably getting to the next level of beating teams above us.

“As much as we’ve spoken about being able to beat the sides beneath us, the next challenge for us is to stand up when it counts.

“We've been discussing it, training for it, preparing for it, but now we’ve probably got to wait until we get out there and have an opportunity to do it.”

And as injured players steadily continue to return from the sidelines, Simpson is confident he will have the team capable of making an impact this year.

Although Jack Darling, Scott Selwood and Mark Hutchings are still weeks away, Simpson confirmed they would be available for selection in NAB Challenge matches.

“It’s a really delicate situation with the injuries because you don’t want to compromise your pre-season to accommodate low numbers, so fortunately we’ve been able to find the balance.

“We’ll have over 40 training with us [on Friday] out of a possible 46.

“The issue we’ve had pre-Christmas has probably been the quality of players not being available to train, but we’ve got them back and we’ve got some pretty good news on some senior players which means they can progress forward.

“Hopefully by NAB 1 we should have everyone available.”

Listen to Simpson's full interview below.