Dean Cox Biography

Dean Cox and Tyson Stenglein are named as Eagles vice-captains to recently appointed skipper Darren Glass with Ashley Hansen, Adam Selwood and Matthew Priddis rounding out the West Coast leadership team.

The leadership group was selected based on votes by the Eagles players. Current vice-captain Andrew Embley was elected not to remain in the leadership group.

Eagles coach John Worsfold said that Embley would still provide leadership to the team while not in an official capacity.

"He possesses certain leadership qualities that we may not have included in the ones that we got the players to vote on," Worsfold said of Embley.

"I'll go through with him the areas in the votes where he was lower in our criteria that he could be higher."

Dean Cox signs with the Eagles for a further four years with the deal making Cox one of the highest paid players in the AFL while meaning that the ruckman will most likely finish his career at West Coast.

"I'm very delighted. The position the club's in at the minute is a very exciting time, with a new young group, and I'm just glad to be a part of it, and be part of it for another four years," he said.

"I was rapt when I was drafted to West Coast, and rapt to end my career here as well. I'm just delighted to be here, hopefully until I retire."

West Coast's Daniel Kerr could join Dean Cox and Andrew Embley on the sidelines for Saturday's western derby clash with Fremantle.

Dean Cox is a certain starter for Round 1 despite nursing a fractured cheekbone.

Port Adelaide plans to shark Dean Cox's hit-outs after Dean Brogan was suspended for Sunday's match at Subiaco.

Saturday night's clash between Eagle Dean Cox and Swan Darren Jolly will pit two of the game's in-form ruckmen.

"He is the elite ruckman in the competition and I think everyone wants to have a go at him," Jolly said of Cox.

"Dean is obviously an elite ruckman and I'd class him as a midfielder as well. He's got a huge engine, a huge tank. It's a big effort to try and run with him and it's something I'll try and counter this week.

"I enjoy the challenge of trying to go out there and beat him, but so far, I think he's beaten me every single time, so I'm really looking forward to Saturday."

West Coast ruckman Dean Cox says the young Eagles team will take time to develop, but has laid the blame for their poor season as the feet of the experienced players.

"Certainly a lot of senior players were to blame - everyone goes 'it must be the younger players' but the senior players need to take an ownership in obviously leading this football club," he said.

"We need to make sure when we have the footy in our hands we execute the way we want to and try and drag the kids along with us."

John Worsfold has backed star pair Dean Cox and Daniel Kerr as they struggle with form and discipline.

"Some of the goals he set up from stoppages, winning the ball and getting it out while under a full tackle were outstanding," Worsfold said of Kerr.

"As our side improves, he'll then win some of the easy possessions as well. But at the moment he is having to knuckle down and get in for the team and do the real hard grunt work."

Cox on the other hand has been criticised for not working hard enough.

"I'm not really sure where all of this is coming from," Worsfold said of the criticism.

"Because some of the people that are criticising him were also comparing him to Polly Farmer eight months ago, so something drastic has happened - I'm not sure what, but it's just a bit of a whim from some people to talk about that."

Besieged West Coast rover Daniel Kerr is in urgent need of reinforcements around stoppages and champion ruckman Dean Cox wants teammates to protect Kerr as the Eagles' most important play initiator.

"We've got to make sure our best playmakers are free," Cox says.

"He's going to be tagged and held on to, but if we can just free him up a bit more it is good for our side to get him back to running with the ball, clearing the footy.

"If 'Kerry' is getting held on to and we can free him up, we're going to be a better side and Daniel will be playing the best footy he can for us.

"So we've got to make it more difficult for his tagger to stop him getting a good run at the football."

West Coast ruckman Dean Cox has a groin complaint and is likely to miss this weekend against Hawthorn.

Nic Naitanui has had his first taste of AFL action but is set to receive an even bigger slice of the pie against Hawthorn on Saturday night.

With four-time All-Australian ruckman Dean Cox struggling to overcome a groin complaint, Naitanui could be thrust into the lead ruck role against the Hawks in just his second game.

Dean Cox will not face reigning premiers Hawthorn in Subiaco due to a groin injury.

Dean Cox could spend a second straight game on the sidelines with a groin injury.

Eagles coach John Worsfold says ruckman Dean Cox is expected to be fit for this week, but needs to prove himself at training.

"We're confident that he'll get up," Worsfold said.

"It was a very minor strain and one that we would expect would have healed by now, (but) you're always just making sure that there's nothing else other than that as well.

"There's no caution taken into account. If he's fit he'll play."

West Coast assistant coach Daniel Metropolis says onballer Daniel Kerr and ruckman Dean Cox could have played this weekend, but the club is pursuing a safety-first policy.

Cox has a groin injury and Kerr is suffering from general soreness and neither player made the trip to freezing Melbourne for Saturday afternoon's clash with the Demons.

"Coxy still just pulled up a little bit sore on Thursday after training. He wanted to play, but we thought it was best that if he's not quite right we'd give him another week to settle down," Metropolis said.

"Kerry's just been a bit sore over the last few weeks. Again we thought he could play, but it was in his best interests to get himself right and get him up and going for the latter part of the year.

"So they should only be another week away."

Eagles ruckman and regular All-Australian Dean Cox could miss the rest of 2009 due to a debilitating groin injury.

"That's a medical decision really so we'll get their advice on all that," Eagles coach John Worsfold said.

"His groin got sore so we really limited his ruck work and ground time, specifically in the second half.

"We now have to reassess where it's at.

"The fact it got sore so quickly is disappointing and we have to work out what the best program is for him."

Dean Cox and Daniel Kerr will spend at least the next fortnight on the sidelines as the Eagles attempt to diagnose their mystery injuries.

The duo will visit a specialist in Adelaide this week in a bid to get the bottom of their complaints, which West Coast medical staff believe are groin related.

"Both players are going to fly to Adelaide with the team on Friday to see a specialist ... just for another opinion on what he thinks may be happening, so that's the next step," Eagles coach John Worsfold said.

"The issue is the soreness they've got came on reasonably suddenly but it hasn't gone suddenly, that's the concern."

West Coast coach John Worsfold says stars Daniel Kerr and Dean Cox will probably not play again this season due to injury.

"When the season finishes we can't stop them from doing anything and think we've fixed the problem," Worsfold said.

"We need to make sure we have. So that means getting them up to a point where they could play. That's a gradual build-up.

"And from there we hope we know we've fixed the problem and then they can have their break and prepare for the pre-season."

West Coast champion tall Dean Cox will not return to the field in 2009 after having decided to take a conversative approach towards rehabilitating his groin injury.

"There was just no point trying to push through for the sake of possibly one game," Cox said.

"We have taken a conservative approach with this program and that is certainly the way to go."

West Coast ruckman Dean Cox appears well over his groin troubles as the Eagles begin pre-season training.

A pre-Christmas abdominal strain may keep ruckman Dean Cox out of West Coast's NAB Cup match against Essendon.

West Coast chief executive Trevor Nisbett says Nic Naitanui and Dean Cox will be a formidable ruck combination for the Eagles in 2010 under coach John Worsfold.

"John's made it clear already that both Dean and Nic will spend a lot of time in the forward line when the other is on the ball," Nisbett said.

"There's no doubt they will both be sharing the workload. John's said that, and that is the great value in having both of them."