Always Right Match Committee R20 vs Essendon 2025

[Scraggers]

Welcome to the Always Right Match Committee Thread. The Match Committee threads has been named after long time WOOF member Always Right who tragically passed away in March 2018.

If you were on the Western Bulldogs match committee, what changes would you make after our Round 19 match against Brisbane for our Round 20 match against Essendon at Marvel on Friday.

For those new to these threads, please give a brief explanation for your changes ... this would add a lot of value to the discussion.

[GVGjr]

Bump

[Hotdog60]

Depends on what happens tomorrow but it could be an opportunity to give some players time to get over some niggles for GWS.
Buss for JOD to rest the ankle
Sellwood for Williams for a kick up the pants
Harmes for Poulter
Buku for McNeil

[Bornadog]

Poulter and McNeil outs for starters.

Ins, I will see how the others go tomorrow

[Danjul]

Earlier in the season we played Fremantle.

Dale had 18 kicks (the most in the team)and gained 500 metres (the most again). He gave the team a lot of drive and momentum. Excellent work.

Libba was close behind with 17 kicks and 440 metres. Ditto. Excellent.

Dale and Libba , great contributors.

Both helped open up the game ahead of the ball, Darcy got 5 goals. We lost but there were some excuses.

In the 5 games from rounds 9 to 14 Sanders had a Total of 17 kicks.

Some important games in there. Gold Coast, Geelong, Hawthorn. Valiant losses. Not saying it’s Sanders fault but we’re getting games into young players.

In those 3 games Vanda had a total of 13 kicks. Last night he had 4 kicks and 70 metres gained. Another valiant loss. It’s just a crying shame that we haven’t got more players who can duplicate Libba’s form against Freo. How might we have fared with another player who kicks and runs and actually gains ground last night?

We might have found out if we had selected the player who had the equal second most kicks and metres gained against Freo. One of the handful of players who kept us in that game. The one who shared those two important stats with Libba. But we didn’t because we have a schizophrenic approach to selection where we don’t know if we are contenders or rebuilding.

Last night was the second week in a row where, at half time, I had had as many kicks as one of the Bulldog players. It is getting bloody exhausting.

[BiteNibbleChomp]

Last night was the second week in a row where, at half time, I had had as many kicks as one of the Bulldog players. It is getting bloody exhausting.

How do you reckon you'd do as a defender? Because there might be a place for you in the side with those numbers

- BNC

[Danjul]

How do you reckon you'd do as a defender? Because there might be a place for you in the side with those numbers

- BNC

I don’t think defence is our greatest concern.

They are under enormous pressure because of the team structure up the ground.

Last night Brisbane had an entry into their forward 50 every 100 seconds on average. Many of these were from players 20 metres from an opponent and therefore under no pressure. They were able to hit teammate’s who had good leading patterns. They didn’t seem to favour the long bombs, just surgical 35 m kicks.

What we must do if we want to defeat top 8 sides is stop the tsunamis out of our forward area.

Here is where I think I can be of greatest value. I will spray small Xs on the grass. Blue for run to here, yellow for kick to here. Red for defend here. All while wearing jumper zero to remind some players of what got us in this mess in the first place.

Anyway I bruise easily.

[doggies ftw]

Easy this week

Cleary Jones JOD (Buss if injured)
Dale Lobb Bramble

Williams Libba Davo
English Bont Richards

Sanders Naughty VDM (Dolan if injured)
Buku Darcy West

Kennedy Freijah Sellwood Garcia sub JJ

In: Buku, Sellwood
out: Poulter, McNeil - JJ to sub

Sellwood for JJ gives us a more defensive edge, Buku is the perfect utility forward to support Darcy & Naughty. Playing Poulter over him is a sackable offence tbh.

so simple, make the right changes please

[Bumper Bulldogs]

I think we need to be as settled as possible from here on in. That said o think Poulter is not on our best 22. He needs to go and replaced with Buku. I want Buku doing the second Rick as we are much better with Darcy and Naughton in the forward 50.

I would love McNeil to the sub role.

I want to also give Scott a go. So he can replace VDM as he rolled him ankle. Give him a rest as he was an important cog earlier in the year and we need him fit.

[Warrnambulldog]

Easy this week

Cleary Jones JOD (Buss if injured)
Dale Lobb Bramble

Williams Libba Davo
English Bont Richards

Sanders Naughty VDM (Dolan if injured)
Buku Darcy West

Kennedy Freijah Sellwood Garcia sub JJ

In: Buku, Sellwood
out: Poulter, McNeil - JJ to sub

Sellwood for JJ gives us a more defensive edge, Buku is the perfect utility forward to support Darcy & Naughty. Playing Poulter over him is a sackable offence tbh.

so simple, make the right changes please

Beat me to the same changes. Well said

[Bumper Bulldogs]

Buku is the perfect utility forward to support Darcy & Naughty. Playing Poulter over him is a sackable offence

You know I fully agree. I hate can’t get my head around is why they actually dropped him to start with. I can’t remember Buku having a bad game. Yea a quite game but he was doing so much blocking for Sam and clearing space with dummy leads. I’m at a loss

[Hotdog60]

Depends on what happens tomorrow but it could be an opportunity to give some players time to get over some niggles for GWS.
Buss for JOD to rest the ankle
Sellwood for Williams for a kick up the pants
Harmes for Poulter
Buku for McNeil

After seeing the game I'll stick with my selection

[Garbs_7]

JOD's ankle will swell up nicely, that was a fair turn and perfect opportunity to give him a week off to rest it and bring Buss in who was great today at VFL level and deserves another run in the 1s. Jonesy gets another chance to impress and settle into the team, if he struggles next week then maybe JOD comes back in for him the following week. Sellwood excellent too and gives us something different in our backline, would love to have a look at him at the highest level.

I'm not a huge fan of Buku as the third tall and I don't think his fwd pressure or ground game is good enough in that role, but deserves a recall and can still play a role as a tall fwd option and is handy up there when Darcy is in the ruck.

IN - Selwood, Buss, Buku
Out - JOD (managed), Poulter, McNeil or JJ (rest).

Bailey Williams to the wing and Sellwood takes his spot down back.

[doggies ftw]

You know I fully agree. I hate can’t get my head around is why they actually dropped him to start with. I can’t remember Buku having a bad game. Yea a quite game but he was doing so much blocking for Sam and clearing space with dummy leads. I’m at a loss

I do agree with others that it’s probably his pressure and tackling which probably isnt good enough. But when you’re replacing him with guys like Poulter and Hynes who don’t offer much in that department anyway I think the upside is worth it. He just brings so much flexibility to the side and he genuinely knows how to play his support tall role and not be the ‘main guy’. Plus he’s legitimately an elite finisher these days, which we always need more of in our forward line.

He does need to be told that his spot is dependant on him pressuring and being an asset defensively, and to be fair he’s probably been told that but doesn’t do it. It frustrates me when talented players can’t get this part of the game right, like it’s so easy anyone can do it. Think it’s just a losing focus type of thing where you forget/zone out when out of the play rather than any laziness thing etc.

A few times in the VFL yesterday he cut off a few d50 exits with his speed & athleticism and I think that would have impressed the coaches more than any of the goals - it’s something he has the ability to do and he realistically should become a defensive asset for our forward line on top of what he brings offensively which is very very decent for the role.

[Rocco Jones]

- Sellwood to free up Truck to play wing. I’m assuming Sellwood can run out an AFL game, obviously could be wrong

- Harmes in for Poulter

- Buss for JOD if his ankle could do with a rest

- Dolan or Hynes for LMN. As anyone unfortunate enough to be in my Dogs what’s app knows, I think too many fans wanna ‘just play the kids’. However, when the benchmark is pretty low, I think we might as well just give a game to Hynes or Dolan.

No to Buku with 3 KPDs already a sacrifice to mobility. I think his 2nd efforts and ground level stuff are as bad as a ruck pinch hitting forward.