AFL Game Day Round 7, 2018 - Western Bulldogs V Gold Coast Suns at Eureka Stadium, Ballarat

[Ozza]

To be honest, I was pretty pleased with the win.
I knew it would be a frustrating day with tricky conditions and personnel challenges (pretty huge difference between Wood/Bont compared to Young/Honeychurch - as well as the host of other best 22 players we have out injured).
Things weren’t going well, but the boys didn’t turn their toes up - they dug in and eked out a win.

[soupman]

Hugely happy with the win. Gold Coast are talented, and even without Lynch and May they have some very good players, and those two losses were cancelled out by us also losing our best player and captain. Jack Martin continues to impress, he has been awesome for two seasons now and is in the top few players I'd be looking to poach from other clubs.

Can understand how people got upset by the umpires, and i did for a couple of decisions, but by and large i thought they were ok. Especially in the first quarter where the huge discrepency in frees happened I thought we did not help ourselves at all. We constantly held the ball to long or executed stuff poorly so they were almost forced to make the decision.

It cannot be understated how impressed I am by Naughton. I was underwhelmed when we drafted him and completely unimpressed by his first two games, but since then he has been playing to a good standard and his game Saturday was immense.

I am cautiously optimistic about this season, we are still very young and a week to week proposition but I'm hoping much like Hawthorn last year we do a mini-rebuild in the first half of the season before turning it on in the second. The fact we have even been competitive this season with the youth and lack of experience we have been playing with is amazing, and you can see some really good finds coming through mainly in defence.

The trio of Naughton, Cordy and Williams has been fantastic to watch since round 3. They work well together, all are great in the air in different ways and odd turnover aside are more than competent with ball in hand. Richards has also been good there obviously, but they have cemented themselves as best 22. McLean continues to take strides forwards, Wallis has been much better after an indifferent 2017, Macrae is a gun and hopefully is getting to the point where the heat starts to come off Bontempelli and English has shown glimpses of what he can be. The forwardline is still lacking emerging stars, although JJ is starting to lift a little. Gowers has been good and should still get better, and Lipinski has shown elements to his game that are promising but still has a while to go.

This was a shitty game in a lot of respects, but winning without Bont should do wonders for the teams self confidence and I feel much better about this season now, at least until the Lions beat us.

[HOSE B ROMERO]

I can seriously recommend making the effort and buying a ticket in the outer at Ballarat. I wasn't too happy about forking out $25 as i'm already paying for a seat at docklands. But the terrace has a lovely thick grass you can sit on at the breaks which goes right up past the wing so it's great viewing. Much better than paying a small fortune for a seat. My 20 year old son, who never really got to experience the suburban grounds, surprisingly loved it.

[bornadog]

I know we found a bit through JJ and Gowers that quarter, we are truly a bottom 3 club. Has that ever happened 18 months after a club won a flag?

How Honeychurch gets games is absolutely beyond me, while we keep playing Boyd in the ruck.....

I’d like to see a new coaching group to be honest.

Is this a serious comment?

[GVGjr]

Is this a serious comment?

I think so, Bulldogs Bite can respond but I think he is referring to the fact we've had the same coaching group for a while now and given the way we are playing the message might not be getting through.

[Bulldog4life]

I think so, Bulldogs Bite can respond but I think he is referring to the fact we've had the same coaching group for a while now and given the way we are playing the message might not be getting through.

It might have looked better if it read I’d like to see a new coaching group to be honest to help Bevo.

[The Bulldogs Bite]

I think so, Bulldogs Bite can respond but I think he is referring to the fact we've had the same coaching group for a while now and given the way we are playing the message might not be getting through.

Yep - this is it.

Most clubs make changes yearly or at least every 24 months, but we've had the same group for a number of years. In general I haven't been a fan of our coaching philosophy over the past 18 months, so I'd like to see some new line of thinking injected into the club.

[Twodogs]

Yep - this is it.

Most clubs make changes yearly or at least every 24 months, but we've had the same group for a number of years. In general I haven't been a fan of our coaching philosophy over the past 18 months, so I'd like to see some new line of thinking injected into the club.

It's still the basic team of assistants that Bevo inherited from B-Mac isn't it? Rohan Smith, Daniel Giansiracusa, Joel Corey and Steven King?

[Axe Man]

It's still the basic team of assistants that Bevo inherited from B-Mac isn't it? Rohan Smith, Daniel Giansiracusa, Joel Corey and Steven King?

Not exactly. Gia played under B-Mac and joined the coaching panel at pretty much the same time as Bevo.

Smith is now the Development Manager and Hansen an assistant.

It is true there hasn't been much new blood over the past few years with coaches/senior football personnel mostly moving positions.

I find it impossible to form a view about assistant coaches, from the outside we have really little idea whether they are good, bad or otherwise.

[bornadog]

Not exactly. Gia played under B-Mac and joined the coaching panel at pretty much the same time as Bevo.

Smith is now the Development Manager and Hansen an assistant.

It is true there hasn't been much new blood over the past few years with coaches/senior football personnel mostly moving positions.

I find it impossible to form a view about assistant coaches, from the outside we have really little idea whether they are good, bad or otherwise.

We have had a number of changes over the past couple of years. This year we have Jordan Russell and Jamie Maddocks come in as Development coaches and Steve Grace for the VFL team who is also an assistant.

[Axe Man]

We have had a number of changes over the past couple of years. This year we have Jordan Russell and Jamie Maddocks come in as Development coaches and Steve Grace for the VFL team who is also an assistant.

Russell has had a coaching role since 2014 and Maddocks started in 2016. Grace is the only outsider to come into the setup in the last couple of years.

[ledge]

I'm not going to judge our coaches as its obvious it's a new bunch of young footballers and it takes Time to get them together , also losing experienced players to injury/ retirement, hasn't helped.
Let's face facts we are the youngest team going around and performing better than teams with better experienced players,
I am interested to see if we improve by the end of the year whether it's tiredness or we aren't getting better .
Next year I believe we will start to gel.
Our backline is terribly young and holding up very well , I think this shows our defence set up is working but we are young in the middle and Dalhaus, Wallis Maclean are doing a lot while the others are missing.

[bornadog]

Russell has had a coaching role since 2014 and Maddocks started in 2016. Grace is the only outsider to come into the setup in the last couple of years.

Russell has just started full time since retiring, but I get what you mean, he has been around awhile in a part time role. Maddocks is someone brought in since BMAC days.

[Twodogs]

Not exactly. Gia played under B-Mac and joined the coaching panel at pretty much the same time as Bevo.

Smith is now the Development Manager and Hansen an assistant.

It is true there hasn't been much new blood over the past few years with coaches/senior football personnel mostly moving positions.

I find it impossible to form a view about assistant coaches, from the outside we have really little idea whether they are good, bad or otherwise.

Do you think it's a bit weird that Bevo didn't bring in at least a few of his own people? People that he's worked with before that he has confidence in.

Even coming in as senior coach it would still be a little intimidating coming into a club culture where everybody has been in their jobs prior to your appointment. I'd find it a bit overwhelming at first. To take all that in and adjust do well that you win a flag in your second year, Bevo must be quite a guy.

[Axe Man]

Do you think it's a bit weird that Bevo didn't bring in at least a few of his own people? People that he's worked with before that he has confidence in.

Even coming in as senior coach it would still be a little intimidating coming into a club culture where everybody has been in their jobs prior to your appointment. I'd find it a bit overwhelming at first. To take all that in and adjust do well that you win a flag in your second year, Bevo must be quite a guy.

Hard to know. Did he have any people? He had just signed on at St Kilda after leaving Hawthorn. Probably unlikely to be able to bring someone in from the Hawks in the middle of their league domination.