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The Western Bulldogs kicked off the 2016 AFL Finals series last night by eliminating the West Coast Eagles in an impressive and unexpected boilover. Check out our talking points from the match!
How far can the Dogs go?
The biggest question after every final is always going to be: can this winning team go on and take out the whole thing? From the position of elimination finals, the answer is almost always no.
That’s probably the case here, but in such an even year, maybe, just maybe, there’s a sliver of hope that the Dogs can make a real run deep into September.
The decision to bring back a number of injured stars paid off marvellously, and they now look primed for a strong finish to the year.
They’ll be up against Hawthorn or Geelong – depending on tonight’s game – at the MCG next week. Then it’s the Swans or the Giants in Sydney for the winner of that match.
You’d think the Bulldogs season probably ends sometime in the next two weeks, but after a performance like that, who would dare to write them off?
West Coast’s wasted year
Eagles coach Adam Simpson said after the match that 2016 felt like a wasted year for his team, and he’s not wrong. After making the grand final in 2015, this season was bitterly disappointing.
What’s most concerning is that the boost we expected the Eagles to get from the recruitments of Jack Redden and Lewis Jetta, as well as the return of Eric Mackenzie, completely failed to materialise. None of the three played last night.
Redden is currently playing WAFL footy. Mackenzie too. Jetta was in the senior side but missed through a calf injury – his form was pretty average anyway. Mackenzie might not be at the club next year.
That’s a pretty big headache for the Eagles and here’s another one – Nic Naitanui is going to miss most, if not all, of the 2017 season. And the Scotty Lycett/Jon Giles/Mitch Brown three-man ruck combo is not a great answer to that problem.
I’m a big believer that the Eagles have the time and the talent to return to premiership contention with this playing group. But there’s a lot of hard work ahead of them if they’re going to do it.
Bye week debate rages on
Footy fans spent much of the past week decrying pre-finals bye week and the result of last night’s game is only going to add more fuel to that fire.
The Eagles were arguably the hottest team in the league going into the first week of finals with three straight wins over top-eight opponents. But did the week off kill their momentum?
The Dogs, on the other hand, brought back five players – four of them from injury – for this match. If it had been played a week earlier, they might not have had that luxury.
It’s a bit of an unpopular opinion but I’m actually a fan of the bye week. In my case, I found it really whet my appetite for finals to begin.
If the Eagles can’t find it in themselves to stay psyched for finals over the weekend off, that’s on them and them alone.
The more chance we have to get injured stars back on the park for finals the better, in my opinion. I’m sure plenty will disagree but the pre-finals bye is fine by me.
Tom’s a big Boyd now
If you took a quick glance at Tom Boyd’s statline from last night you might not be that impressed – fourteen disposals and 0.2 on the scoreboard.
But despite not kicking a goal it was arguably Boyd’s best ever performance at AFL level simply due to his ability to impact in the ruck, take some important marks, and offer quality defensive pressure as a forward.
Those are all question marks we’ve had over Boyd at one stage or another and really, seeing him contribute so well in those areas is nearly more impressive than if he’d booted a bag of goals instead.
If you re-did the Rising Star votes this morning…
Caleb Daniel would have to be a pretty big chance to steal the win. He was arguably best on ground last night.
33 disposals – most on ground. Five goal assists – most on ground. And a goal of his own. Not a bad effort when you’re playing just your 31st career game, on the finals stage, away from home.
Callum Mills will get his own chance to show his worth on Saturday, but regardless of which is the two is really better, there can be no doubt that the Bulldogs got an absolute steal drafting this superstar at pick 46.