West Coast’s lack of discipline is hurting their ability to make significant inroads in their rebuild, with the Eagles the second-worst side in the AFL for free kicks conceded.

Andrew McQualter’s side gave away 23 free kicks in their disastrous 11-point defeat to Richmond at Optus Stadium on Saturday, including a costly 50m penalty that led to a goal in the tense final term.

West Coast are averaging 21 free kicks against this season, second only to North Melbourne (22) as they struggle to keep their composure siren to siren.

It became a stark problem in the loss to the Tigers, with a 50m penalty to South Fremantle product Steely Green after no Eagle stood the mark, which led to a goal at a crucial point of the final quarter.

Co-captain Liam Duggan also gave away a free kick for holding Mykelti Lefau in the first term, which led to a major when the Tigers struggled early.

And West Coast have three of the top 10 worst offenders in the league with Harley Reid leading the competition with 22 for the season followed by Liam Baker (16) and injured midfielder Jack Graham (15).

It comes only weeks after Eagles coach Andrew McQualter hit out at his team’s ill-discipline in their Gather Round loss to Geelong when they gave away three goals to free kicks.

“We let ourselves down today in that part of the game,” McQualter said after the Cats’ defeat.

“That was disappointing. It’s something we need to rectify really quickly. We can’t afford to be undisciplined and give away any scores. We’ll get to work on it.”

“Sometimes frustration boils over. Sometimes fatigue comes into it. But ultimately it is a team game, and you can’t let your own individual frustrations become a team problem.”

Former St Kilda coach Scott Watters said young teams could not afford to be undisciplined when they were desperate for any advantages.

“When you’re scrapping and clawing to come from the bottom of the ladder and move your way up, those small disciplinary actions, they’re paramount,” he said.

“You’ve got to grab every single one per cent opportunity that’s in front of you because you’re not there as a list yet. So there’s no margin for error with discipline.

“They don’t have a lot of margin for errors, so it’s why they sort of oscillate from a competitive performance to a blowout performance.

“Their margins for error are really small at the moment, because they’re still very much growing and developing.”

McQualter conceded the fact that the seven more free kicks than the Tigers hurt them in the upset loss.

“It hurt us, in the last quarter (they kicked) two goals from 50s and 23 free kicks against is a pretty high number,” he said.

“There were a lot of free kicks paid; we gave away a large amount. It certainly hurts our pressure game, it hurts your ability to win the contest, so it’s a work on for us.”