East Perth Wingman Angus Scott will put his hand up to play this Friday after fully returning to training this week. 

Scott broke his thumb during a preseason hit out against West Perth in Joondalup, seeing him ruled out for the opening two rounds of the WAFL season. 

Last season, Scott carried a similar thumb injury, however, coach Ross McQueen has confirmed it is unrelated, calling it a ‘freak accident’ resulting from him accidentally running into a goal umpire. 

“He trained last week, and he’ll train fully this week. He’ll be one of ones at training and show that he’s nice and sharp to put his hand up to be considered,” he told SportsFM.

“He’s a fit man. He’ll be ready to go. In terms of that capacity. It’s is just now whether he’s got enough football into him to see how he goes.” 

Defender Kyle Willcocks (Hamstring) is also a chance to play this Friday, while Corey Watts (Calf)  is reportedly still a week or two away, according to McQueen.

The Royals have had a strong start to their 2025 season, beating Subiaco and Swan Districts and shooting straight to the top of the ladder.

But on Good Friday, under the lights of Sullivan Logistics Stadium, they’ll face a third-placed Claremont, who are fresh off a massive 80-point win against East Freo.

McQueen says it’s a great opportunity for the Royals to play a ‘formed’ WAFL side.

They’ve started really strongly, still a few boys around from when I used to be there at Claremont but a lot of them have moved on and they’ve got some new blood coming through. 

“They’ve been very positive, their football has been very strong. They’ve got a strong work ethic up and down the ground,” he said.

“They play a high-energy brand of football, really competitive, really combative type game of football nowadays. 

“I don’t know about a final preview or anything. It’s a fair way out in April, but it’ll be a great opportunity for us to go up against one of the in-form teams of competition.” 

Last weekend, East Perth kept a shaky Swan Districts side at bay, winning 97-42 and keeping them scoreless for the final quarter. 

However, despite a dominate performance across the board, McQueen is mostly satisfied but still believes his side can improve. 

“We always take the wins. Anytime we can get a win, we take those,” he said. 

“We’ve defended not too badly at most times, but that’s still an area which we would like to get right. Our ability to do that when really under pressure and tend to have momentum. That’s been a little bit of concern at different times.” 

“At this time of year, you can get a couple of wins, and we always think we can get better. 

“We’ll work on those couple of things tonight at training after we set ourselves for a big game this Friday night.”

IMAGE: East Perth FC