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Round 13 Preview – Friday 7 June 7:40pm AEST
Western Bulldogs v Brisbane Lions
I had pre-written a lot of this preview before Friday night, and was planning to start by discussing how both the Lions and Dogs were the same teams this year: massive underperformers despite still having some great fundamental underlying stats. A lot of advanced metrics prior to round 11 had the Dogs and us as the best two teams after Sydney, despite the win-loss record.
…and then the Dogs had to go and have their most impressive win of the season, beating Collingwood by 3 goals and ruining the whole comparison I had written out.
I have to hand it to the crafty pies though for giving up a couple of late goals to ensure that they maintained their incredible close game record. The Pies just know how to avoid losing the close games by conceding late goals!
Injury lists – Aside from the four out for the season, based on the week 11 injury list Starce might be a chance to come back, while Will Ashcroft is still 6 weeks away.
For the Dogs, Weightman and Naughton are a month away, and Harmes and Vandemeer suffered apparent hamstring injuries in the win against the Pies. Darcy is a likely out due to a 2 week suspension, but there is a chance that Ed Richards and Liberatore are back from concussions. Rhylee West was given a one week ban but I wouldn’t be surprised if he challenges that.
Last time we met – Round 3 2023 - Bulldogs 10.7 (57) dftd Lions 7.11 (53).
The dogs held us off all night and kicked away late and won thanks to five goals from Jamarra Ugle-Hagan. Our ball movement was dour, and our key forwards disappointing as we slumped to a 1-2 record. Funnily enough, it was probably Gunston’s best outing for us if we appropriately ignore the West Coast game.
Highlights
Form wise we have really struggled against the Dogs away. We’ve never beaten them away from the Gabba under Fages, and our last victory in Melbourne against them was in 2014.
Where are the Dogs at?
Sitting at 6-6 with wins against the Suns, Saints, Eagles, Tigers, Giants and Pies, they are the typical Luke Beveridge Dogs team. When healthy they are blessed with great talent up forward and in the middle, with Bont still to me the best player in the competition and capable deputies along side him. The second best percentage in the comp indicates that they are capable of better than a 6-6 record.
Bevo’s been playing selection games this year that have annoyed people on twitter who talk about fantasy football in their bios, but I’ve generally been on his side. Sanders was a young player learning his craft so subbing him out and dropping him was ok – despite it frustrating people who spend too much time paying attention to kick and handball counts. McRae is a good accumulator, but was never athletic so with Treloar being fit pretty much all year and Richards showing he can contribute in the midfield, his opportunities have been more limited though he’s back in the team currently.
The treatment of Bailey Dale was a bit weirder, given that their defence is the weakest part of the team. He’s back now and playing good football. Down back, they can be suspect when they don’t take intercept marks, having very low numbers in some of their losses.
Where are we at? What is our Brand? What do we stand for? When will woke Fages stop the PC Press Conferences? Does David King repeat himself all the time?
Yes:
Where are we at? Nowhere good. Last year I was watching games and posting in the stats thread regularly to try dissect whether the tweaks to our gameplan would take us over the edge. And for most of the year I wasn’t quite sure we had it, until finals when it was nearly enough.
I guess the thing that is stumping me is where has the drop off come from – and outside of the forward line which I’ll get to in a bit, it is not super obvious where the problem is. In fact, on a lot of key statistical metrics that previous premiers performed well in, we are more than good enough:
Beyond individual player form and selection, which I'm sure will be hotly debated in the comments, to me our biggest issue has been our biggest strength for years – our forward connection and converting inside 50s into shots, and then converting those shots. We are #1 for inside 50 differential by quite a bit but 10th for scores per inside 50 at 42%. Last year we were second at 45% - so the drop off is significant, but ultimately isn’t crazy.
The biggest issue by fire is shot conversion. If the whole competition had scored according statistical averages based on shot location, we’d be having a very different conversation about this team:
Unfortunately, conversion is a skill and our best forwards are all among the worst in the competition. I don’t think it is an insurmountable problem to fix over the medium term, as we rebounded from dreadful conversion to being one of the best teams in 2021-222.
Improving our ball movement and the speed of ball movement would go a long way to getting higher quality shots too.
Selection and Gameplan - Hipwood in for Ryan is an absolute certainty. The big one to be debated will be whether Rayner gets dropped. I think the bye might have saved him and he’ll be given a week or two before match committee faces the music and drops him. I’d probably avoid bringing Starce back if there is any doubt as Answerth has been perfectly fine.
Gameplan wise Bont has consistently killed us and I expect we’ll send Dunkley or Berry to him. I know Berry has been playing better as an inside mid, but I actually don’t love the balance when both him and Dunkley are in there – it leaves two players who I think are more focused on their opponent than hunting the footy, and it did nothing to actually mitigate the Hawks’ clearances last week.
There’s an opportunity with so many of their best forwards out to lock down on Ugle‑Hagan. I expect Lobb to try tag Harris and we might rotate Payne onto him to ensure Harris has a match up he doesn’t have to worry about.
If we can get supply forward and our forwards can kick straight we have a chance. But I’m not counting on it.
Tip: Hard to see us beating the dogs in our current form even with all their outs. Bont has dealt with us comfortably before and I don’t think we have an answer. If libba is back and is anything like himself, their midfield will have too many options and they’ll get enough ball forward that they’ll score more than us. I don’t think we’ll be thrashed like we were by GWS, but a close but comfortable win for the Dogs seems likely to me.
Dogs by 3 goals
Western Bulldogs v Brisbane Lions
I had pre-written a lot of this preview before Friday night, and was planning to start by discussing how both the Lions and Dogs were the same teams this year: massive underperformers despite still having some great fundamental underlying stats. A lot of advanced metrics prior to round 11 had the Dogs and us as the best two teams after Sydney, despite the win-loss record.
…and then the Dogs had to go and have their most impressive win of the season, beating Collingwood by 3 goals and ruining the whole comparison I had written out.
I have to hand it to the crafty pies though for giving up a couple of late goals to ensure that they maintained their incredible close game record. The Pies just know how to avoid losing the close games by conceding late goals!
Injury lists – Aside from the four out for the season, based on the week 11 injury list Starce might be a chance to come back, while Will Ashcroft is still 6 weeks away.
For the Dogs, Weightman and Naughton are a month away, and Harmes and Vandemeer suffered apparent hamstring injuries in the win against the Pies. Darcy is a likely out due to a 2 week suspension, but there is a chance that Ed Richards and Liberatore are back from concussions. Rhylee West was given a one week ban but I wouldn’t be surprised if he challenges that.
Last time we met – Round 3 2023 - Bulldogs 10.7 (57) dftd Lions 7.11 (53).
The dogs held us off all night and kicked away late and won thanks to five goals from Jamarra Ugle-Hagan. Our ball movement was dour, and our key forwards disappointing as we slumped to a 1-2 record. Funnily enough, it was probably Gunston’s best outing for us if we appropriately ignore the West Coast game.
Highlights
| Season | Rnd | Home Team | Away Team | Ground | Date | ||||||||||||
| 2024 | R13 | Western Bulldogs | v | Brisbane Lions | Marvel Stadium | Jun 7 (Fri 7:40pm) | |||||||||||
| 2023 | R3 | Western Bulldogs | 1.2 | 4.3 | 8.4 | 10.7 | (67) | dftd | Brisbane Lions | 1.3 | 2.7 | 6.8 | 7.11 | (53) | Marvel Stadium | Mar 30 (Thu 7:20pm) | |
| 2022 | R16 | Brisbane Lions | 1.5 | 6.9 | 12.11 | 16.12 | (108) | dftd | Western Bulldogs | 2.5 | 5.7 | 7.9 | 9.13 | (67) | Gabba | Jun 30 (Thu 7:20pm) | |
| 2021 | SF | Brisbane Lions | 5.3 | 6.5 | 9.9 | 11.12 | (78) | lost to | Western Bulldogs | 3.4 | 6.6 | 7.11 | 11.13 | (79) | Gabba | Sep 4 (Sat 7:20pm) | |
| 2021 | R4 | Western Bulldogs | 3.3 | 7.6 | 9.10 | 10.13 | (73) | dftd | Brisbane Lions | 2.1 | 3.4 | 6.6 | 8.6 | (54) | Mars Stadium | Apr 10 (Sat 1:45pm) |
Form wise we have really struggled against the Dogs away. We’ve never beaten them away from the Gabba under Fages, and our last victory in Melbourne against them was in 2014.
Where are the Dogs at?
Sitting at 6-6 with wins against the Suns, Saints, Eagles, Tigers, Giants and Pies, they are the typical Luke Beveridge Dogs team. When healthy they are blessed with great talent up forward and in the middle, with Bont still to me the best player in the competition and capable deputies along side him. The second best percentage in the comp indicates that they are capable of better than a 6-6 record.
Bevo’s been playing selection games this year that have annoyed people on twitter who talk about fantasy football in their bios, but I’ve generally been on his side. Sanders was a young player learning his craft so subbing him out and dropping him was ok – despite it frustrating people who spend too much time paying attention to kick and handball counts. McRae is a good accumulator, but was never athletic so with Treloar being fit pretty much all year and Richards showing he can contribute in the midfield, his opportunities have been more limited though he’s back in the team currently.
The treatment of Bailey Dale was a bit weirder, given that their defence is the weakest part of the team. He’s back now and playing good football. Down back, they can be suspect when they don’t take intercept marks, having very low numbers in some of their losses.
Where are we at? What is our Brand? What do we stand for? When will woke Fages stop the PC Press Conferences? Does David King repeat himself all the time?
Yes:
Where are we at? Nowhere good. Last year I was watching games and posting in the stats thread regularly to try dissect whether the tweaks to our gameplan would take us over the edge. And for most of the year I wasn’t quite sure we had it, until finals when it was nearly enough.
I guess the thing that is stumping me is where has the drop off come from – and outside of the forward line which I’ll get to in a bit, it is not super obvious where the problem is. In fact, on a lot of key statistical metrics that previous premiers performed well in, we are more than good enough:
Beyond individual player form and selection, which I'm sure will be hotly debated in the comments, to me our biggest issue has been our biggest strength for years – our forward connection and converting inside 50s into shots, and then converting those shots. We are #1 for inside 50 differential by quite a bit but 10th for scores per inside 50 at 42%. Last year we were second at 45% - so the drop off is significant, but ultimately isn’t crazy.
The biggest issue by fire is shot conversion. If the whole competition had scored according statistical averages based on shot location, we’d be having a very different conversation about this team:
Unfortunately, conversion is a skill and our best forwards are all among the worst in the competition. I don’t think it is an insurmountable problem to fix over the medium term, as we rebounded from dreadful conversion to being one of the best teams in 2021-222.
Improving our ball movement and the speed of ball movement would go a long way to getting higher quality shots too.
Selection and Gameplan - Hipwood in for Ryan is an absolute certainty. The big one to be debated will be whether Rayner gets dropped. I think the bye might have saved him and he’ll be given a week or two before match committee faces the music and drops him. I’d probably avoid bringing Starce back if there is any doubt as Answerth has been perfectly fine.
Gameplan wise Bont has consistently killed us and I expect we’ll send Dunkley or Berry to him. I know Berry has been playing better as an inside mid, but I actually don’t love the balance when both him and Dunkley are in there – it leaves two players who I think are more focused on their opponent than hunting the footy, and it did nothing to actually mitigate the Hawks’ clearances last week.
There’s an opportunity with so many of their best forwards out to lock down on Ugle‑Hagan. I expect Lobb to try tag Harris and we might rotate Payne onto him to ensure Harris has a match up he doesn’t have to worry about.
If we can get supply forward and our forwards can kick straight we have a chance. But I’m not counting on it.
Tip: Hard to see us beating the dogs in our current form even with all their outs. Bont has dealt with us comfortably before and I don’t think we have an answer. If libba is back and is anything like himself, their midfield will have too many options and they’ll get enough ball forward that they’ll score more than us. I don’t think we’ll be thrashed like we were by GWS, but a close but comfortable win for the Dogs seems likely to me.
Dogs by 3 goals
