Peel Football League product Hayden Ballantyne was too expensive for the West Coast Eagles to recruit during the 2016 AFL trade period.
It was reported the Fremantle Docker expressed a desire to leave his club during a horror 2016 season, electing the Eagles as his preferred destination.
But a trade that shocked the footy world and saw perennial Hawthorn champion Sam Mitchell land at West Coast laid heavy restrictions on the Eagles’ remaining salary cap, disabling them from snaring Ballantyne.
West Coast general manager of football Craig Vozzo told Radio 6PR’s Sportsworld that despite Ballantyne being a player the Eagles rated highly, it was impossible to bring him to the club.
“Hayden expressed a want to leave his football club, I think, at one point,” Vozzo said.
“Our position has always been, we’ve got some TPP (total player payments) restrictions, we don’t even know what our TPP is which is a bit unusual at this time of year for all clubs.
“We’re working on some estimates and when we brought in Sam (Mitchell) that made it very difficult to bring in another player of any significant value in terms of money.
“That was basically the long and short of it, he’s a great little player but we’ve got TPP restrictions and we had priorities to fill.”
Vozzo said that the Eagles would most likely look at youth in the upcoming drafts, rather than a delisted free agent to play as a small forward.
“We’re not going to look in the free agency period market for that sort of player,” Vozzo said.
“We’ll definitely look through the draft period, whether that’s the main draft or the rookie draft.”