Premiership coach Denis Pagan reveals his plan to fix the Western Bulldogs

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Originally Posted by Ozza

I think Denis Pagan has earned enough respect in the football world to be able to offer an opinion on the difficulties that face premiership sides the year afterwards - particularly seeing as he was a defending premiership coach twice.

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and basically his article pointed out the bleeding obvious.

When he coached football was very different.

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Originally Posted by bornadog

and basically his article pointed out the bleeding obvious.

When he coached football was very different.

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Football tactics have changed. And Pagan hasn't referred to any tactical changes he would make.
The comments that he has made are around re-invigorating the mindset and attitude to get up and going coming off a form slump.

Tactics have changed. But the concept of a coach getting the team to gel and perform together as a team is still very relevant - and its something Pagan was the best at in the 90s.

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Originally Posted by bornadog

I really thought the effort of the players all over the ground wasn't as bad as the scoreboard suggests, however, our disposal and movement was really way off. Handballs to either feet or over heads, field passes way off target and general skills were way off. Melbourne's pressure was way better than ours and many players got caught and couldn't break tackles.

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I'm defiantly no expert but that's how I saw it, also we don't have the ability to kick to a team mates advantage, the ball always seems to go to the advantage of the defender.

Do the players have to get perms?

It isn't just our hardness at the ball that has dropped away, it is also our work rate.

Last year we were clearly the best side when we didn't have the ball - our defensive running as a team was second to none, and we moved as a swarm from contest to contest. Now half the team just walks around like Brown's cows when the ball leaves their area, and opponents slice through our defence like a hot knife through butter.

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Originally Posted by Flamethrower

It isn't just our hardness at the ball that has dropped away, it is also our work rate.

Last year we were clearly the best side when we didn't have the ball - our defensive running as a team was second to none, and we moved as a swarm from contest to contest. Now half the team just walks around like Brown's cows when the ball leaves their area, and opponents slice through our defence like a hot knife through butter.

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Spot on. If a player has the ball 20 times that would mean he would be lucky to have that ball in his hands for 1 minute all up if you timed it. So then what is he doing for the other 119 minutes? That's where the game is won and lost. Take care of the 119 minutes and the 1 minute will take care of itself.

I've got no idea what goes on inside the club walls, but assume engagement, buy in, ownership, coaching through the grow model etc are things we do. We need to rediscover what our trademark is and get the playing group back to a level of drive they'll leave no stone unturned to achieve it.

Didn't mind this article.

Looking forward to seeing us again this weekend.

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Originally Posted by Scorlibo

One of the best points to come from the article for me is that we have 'no real strength this year'. It's been a luxury to hang our hat on contested ball numbers, and build from there. It's something that McCartney got dead right. A slip from 1st in contested ball to 16th is unacceptable in itself, but quite removed from that - what are we about now if not contested ball? Can this group be about anything else?

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When we got our hands on the ball last year, that was it, we would always work it out to the outside with lightning handball and be on our way. Now the good contested ball sides (Sydney, Geelong, Melbourne) are tackling us and turning the ball over. We need to become the best at that again - not so much winning the ball, but getting it out of congestion into the clear for a clean, targeted kick forward

Just on coaching, are we missing Brett Montgomery? He was there for 6 years and the most seniors of the assistants. I always felt that he saw things differently to Bevo, which is a nice mix to have.

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Originally Posted by boydogs

When we got our hands on the ball last year, that was it, we would always work it out to the outside with lightning handball and be on our way. Now the good contested ball sides (Sydney, Geelong, Melbourne) are tackling us and turning the ball over. We need to become the best at that again - not so much winning the ball, but getting it out of congestion into the clear for a clean, targeted kick forward

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Yep. We were really good at just hacking the ball forward last year in an inevitable forward push. That urgency has gone.

Didn't want to start a new thread.

Denis has just trained a Victoria Derby win. He has had his license for 6 months, and I think this is his only horse.

What an achievement.

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Originally Posted by bornadog

Didn't want to start a new thread.

Denis has just trained a Victoria Derby win. He has had his license for 6 months, and I think this is his only horse.

What an achievement.

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And he owns it outright.

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Originally Posted by Doggy

And he owns it outright.

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Handy prize money of $1.2 milion, less costs like jockey fee.

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Originally Posted by bornadog

Handy prize money of $1.2 milion, less costs like jockey fee.

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Especially as he only paid 50k for him.

And the Bulldogs are still a “nice” bunch.