West Coast coach Andrew McQualter has defended young star Harley Reid barely 24 hours after criticising the midfielder for giving away costly free kicks in the Gather Round loss to Geelong in Adelaide.

The second-year coach admitted post-game the 20-year-old had “let himself down” after giving away a blatant 50-metre penalty for knocking the ball out of Cat Sam De Koning’s hands after a mark.

It led to a goal and was just one of five free kicks West Coast gave away that led to Geelong majors as they went down by 46 points at Norwood Oval.

McQualter also said in his post-game interview it wasn’t the way he wanted Reid to conduct himself.

“That was not the way we want Harley to play. I also thought he had parts of his game that was strong. We’ll keep working with him like we do with all of our players,” he said.

However, speaking to 7NEWS on Monday evening, the former Richmond assistant said he didn’t think it was becoming an issue for the rising star, stating his frustrations were more team-wide.

“I’m not sure it’s becoming an issue, it’s just in that game unfortunately we had three 50-metre penalties and five goals directly from free kicks and the position we’re in we just have to tidy that up a little bit, and we’re wary of it,” McQualter said on 7NEWS.

“It’s something we’re working really hard on, and I’m sure we’ll rectify it this week.”

McQualter added he was still proud of the way Reid was conducting himself in front of his young teammates.

“Harley’s just so influential in the way in everything that he does, and we love the way he’s going about his footy, and I think he played a really strong game on Sunday,” he said.

“So, we appreciate how influential he is and the story he creates, and we love him in our team.”

Reid’s physical performance was a major bounce-back after being tagged out of the contest in the 128-point flogging at the hands of Sydney the previous week.

He collected 22 disposals and a goal against the Cats while turning around his clearance numbers with six after only winning one while being tagged by James Jordon.