Deep dive: Follow all the fallout from the Western Bulldogs’ big win over Essendon
Dyson Heppell, Dylan Shiel and Jake Stringer. You can’t take that much talent out of a side, in particular a midfield, and expect it to survive. But with no members of that trio coming back next week, where does it leave the Bombers?
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It takes a while to cast aside first impressions in AFL football.
For Tim English the early stages of his career have been forever linked with All-Australian ruckman Brodie Grundy.
The Magpies star has torched English every time they’ve crossed paths – including the opening round this year – and the beatings have stuck.
On Friday night English decided enough was enough so he did a Grundy on Essendon.
He brushed aside journeyman Andrew Phillips and then started picking off any Bomber who got in his way as he led the Bulldogs to an emphatic 42-point victory.
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The 22-year-old, who was playing his 36th game, was unstoppable collecting a career-high 22 disposals which included 17 contested possessions, four tackles, six clearances, 17 hit-outs and a goal.
His tap behind his head at a centre bounce in the opening quarter to a running Marcus Bontempelli which ended with a Matt Suckling goal was simply a thing of beauty.
Channel 7’s Brian Taylor summed up his performance brilliantly by saying: “The Essendon ruckman are failing the English exam at the moment.”
“The midfield has given me a lot of confidence, especially after last week we lost that battle so it was a real focus for us to start from the word go and set the pace,” English said.
“I felt like over summer I was able to work on my fitness and had an uninterrupted pre-season, so I had a lot of confidence in my running ability and tried to play to that strength.”
Bulldogs skipper Marcus Bontempelli was full of praise for English.
“The big fella he’s still growing from week to week and I think you saw his transition game come into it with his marking and aerial ability, he’s still continuing to challenge himself in the ruck and we benefited from his good work today,” he said.
Western Bulldogs coach Luke Beveridge labelled it the best performance of English’s career.
“To see the way he attacked it at the start of the game lifted everyone else and he was strong at stoppage and his work around the ground was fantastic,” Beveridge said.
“So for him to have a really dominant night, it’s exciting for our football club.
“Tonight was an awakening for him that he can have a significant impact on the game but there are still huge challenges up ahead for him, some very good big men in the game, and Jarrod Witts is 206cm so it’s not going to get easier for him against Gold Coast on Thursday night.”
CAN BOMBERS FIX GRAND CANYON SIZED MIDFIELD HOLE?
Dylan Shiel was always going to leave a big hole in the Essendon midfield but no-one expected it to be on the Grand Canyon scale.
Without their prime mover courtesy of a two-week suspension, the Bombers were overwhelmed by the pressure and intensity of the Dogs who were a completely different outfit to the one which was flogged by Carlton five days earlier.
You can’t take that much talent out of a side, in particular a midfield, and expect it to go head to head with one of the best going around.
And so it was with the Bombers who were crushed by the Dogs at the coalface on Friday night.
Without Heppell, Stringer and Dylan Shiel, they were left wanting.
“We can’t worry too much about who’s not out there, we learn about the players who had the chance to show what they could do tonight,” coach John Worsfold said.
“The Bulldogs were just too strong in the contest and we didn’t put anywhere near enough pressure on them when they were winning that contested ball, and allowed them to take it forward too easily.
“The guys in there tonight there were some good lessons, a side like the Bulldogs how they set up and who they had going in there … in the last quarter the boys fought on pretty strong but that first half they really had the game on their terms.
“They obviously had a lot more maturity in that midfield, we were relatively young for big parts with Snelling and McGrath and Cahill for a while … their experience in that area of the game is miles ahead of ours and that’s an area we’re going to continue to build as our mids play more footy together.”
Andy McGrath tried hard (eight contested possessions and six clearances), Darcy Parrish (22) and David Zaharakis (20) accumulated possession but didn’t hurt the Dogs and Devon Smith was rarely sighted with just 15.
The backline was under constant pressure and Adam Saad held up strongly but small forwards Anthony McDonald-Tipungwuti and Jacob Townsend had just seven kicks and one goal between them.
The bright spark was defender Jordan Ridley who was playing just his 15th game and showed great composure under pressure.
He took three intercept marks in the first five minutes and had to stand Marcus Bontempelli at the opening bounce.
Brayden Ham also showed dash at the other end with classy ball use going inside 50.
HAS BONT FOUND HIS BEST?
MARCUS Bontempelli had only played one good game all year by his standards, according to Jason Dunstall pre-match.
“He’s had a couple decent ones and three well below the standards he would normally set,” he said.
The Dogs captain started the season with 15, 24, 16, 19, 11 and 22 but Friday night he was back.
Bontempelli started deep forward and it was Tom Liberatore, Jack Macrae and Bailey Smith who did the early damage around the footy.
But when he got going, Bontempelli was at his influential best to finish with 23 disposals, five clearances and a game-high four score assists.
And he was in the perfect position behind English to take the ball away from a centre bounce to set up a Matt Suckling goal.
Macrae had a game-high 29 disposals but the Bulldogs’ dominance was built on an even spread and pressure.
Liberatore forced a turnover on the back-flank through gut running and it led to Patrick Lipinski’s goal at the other end. Caleb Daniel hunted down Jayden Laverde to catch him holding the ball, and Lachie Hunter’s follow-up work to effect a turnover in defence when the game was well and truly over in the last quarter was so typical of the Dogs’ performance.
“We surveyed what Essendon has been doing, they play a very dynamic, quick play, they rush forward and there’s some vulnerability for anyone who plays against them and they looked threatening in the paddock,” Beveridge said.
“But our players managed to curtail that and our mids were instrumental in that with their pressure and how they supported Tim at the source.”
DEBUTANT’S STUNNING GOAL
The last thing Cody Weightman did before he left the training ground outside Metricon Stadium on Thursday was walk to the pocket with a footy.
As his teammates began boarding the bus to take them back to their Gold Coast resort, a few of them couldn’t help themselves and had the impossible shot on from 45m out on a tight angle.
Just over 24 hours later on the exact same position on the ground, only this time inside Metricon Stadium at Carrara, Weightman announced himself to the AFL world with a breathtaking set shot goal on debut for the Western Bulldogs.
Weightman spent six months “acclimating himself to the speed of the game”, according to coach Luke Beveridge, but took just 10 seconds to show it was where he belongs.
Mid-way through the first quarter, the Bulldogs’ No. 15 draft pick led at the footy and jumped over teammate Bailey Dale to take a terrific mark. He then went back and kicked a ridiculous banana goal with his first kick in AFL footy.
“I don’t think I’d had a touch yet, so I looked around and Bont put on a lead so I probably could have given that and it was probably a bit far (out) but fortunately it went through,” he said.
“You don’t really know what you’re doing but it was a bit of fun, an absolute blast out there, I bloody loved it.”
Coach Luke Beveridge rated it “one of the best first kicks that anyone’s ever had in AFL footy I would have thought”.
Mitch Wallis, who announced to the group that Weightman was debuting at training on Wednesday, knew Weightman had it in him, but didn’t expect it so soon.
“We know what you bring, how exciting you play and your ability to mark one-on-one, but we’re not looking for the remarkable stuff on the weekend – it’s about you being the reliable forward pressure player that we know you are.”
The remarkable stuff can wait? Yeah right.
In the second quarter Weightman took another flashy mark and was super-clean at ground level, he sprayed a set shot wide but his second goal early in the fourth quarter was due in equal parts brilliance as it was to hard work.
The 19-year-old won possession at half-forward then sprinted inside 50m, swooped on a loose ball and instinctively threw it on his boot and watched it sail through.
That’s not to say the one-percenters weren’t there either.
Just as importantly in the last quarter he put himself in the firing line and took heavy contact from his Essendon opponent to win possession, and Wallis jogged from full forward to pat him on the back.
“He didn’t have a lot of involvement with the Sherrin but he works extremely hard, I think he might have been the one who smothered that ball when Ed Richards had that goal, so it was an encouraging and impressive first outing for him,” Beveridge said.
“He’s worked hard and he’s earned it.”
There was nice symmetry to Weightman’s debut with former Dandenong teammate and good friend Ned Cahill also debuting on the same night for Essendon.
Cahill’s first act was to out-mark Caleb Daniel from a centre clearance kick and while it wasn’t paid but he moved it on and led to Jayden Laverde’s goal.
After the final siren Weightman lined up and bumped knuckles with every Essendon player, except Cahill, who he hugged.
“I love Neddy, he’s an absolute ripper, I haven’t seen him for a while obviously and we said during the week we’ve defied covid and managed to get in a catch-up, so it was really good to see him out there,” Weightman said.
BRUCE RADAR GOES AWRY
Two weeks ago Josh Bruce endeared himself to his new team by kicking six straight against North Melbourne.
The former Saint has been renowned for his accuracy throughout his career but the radar went very wonky at Metricon Stadium.
He was on target early with a set shot from 40 metres in the opening quarter going straight – although his opponent Hooker was adamant he’d touched it on the mark but a review was inconclusive.
Bruce’s next two set shots from between 40-50m both ended up out on the full and then early in the second quarter another set shot from directly in front barely made it in for a point.
Fortunately for the Dogs spearhead his case of the yips wasn’t an issue as his team spread the load with Mitch Wallis leading the way with three goals.
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SCOREBOARD
WESTERN BULLDOGS 4.1 6.4 11.7 14.9 (93)
def
ESSENDON 3.3 4.3 4.6 7.9 (51)
GOALS
Essendon: Laverne 2, McDonald-Tipungwuti, Snelling, Hooker, Zaharakis, Smith
Western Bulldogs: Wallis 3, Suckling 2, Weightman 2, Bruce, English, Johannisen, Lipinski, Richards, Vandermeer, Dale
SCOTT GULLAN’S BEST
Essendon: McGrath, Ridley, Saad, Parish
Western Bulldogs: English, Bontempelli, Liberatore, Macrae, Hunter, Wallis, Smith
INJURIES
Essendon: Nil
Western Bulldogs: Nil
SCOTT GULLAN’S VOTES
3 – Tim English (Western Bulldogs)
2 – Marcus Bontempelli (Western Bulldogs)
1 – Tom Liberatore (Western Bulldogs)
Originally published as Deep dive: Follow all the fallout from the Western Bulldogs’ big win over Essendon