Every Word Luke Beveridge said on What Went Wrong v Melbourne, Jackson Macrae, Ryley Sanders and the Score Review
Season 2024 got off to a disappointing start for the Western Bulldogs, as they lose their Round 1 encounter with Melbourne by 45 points. Despite kicking the first two goals of the game, and being within touch of Melbourne for most of the match, the Bulldogs were blown away in the last quarter, conceding six goals to two.
Senior coach Luke Beveridge sat down to conduct his regular post-match press conference after the match, and talked about several topics, including the decision to demote Jackson Macrae and Caleb Daniel, subbing out Ryley Sanders, and just what went wrong for the Bulldogs in their defeat.
Question: Bevo, really good start first few minutes. You’re winning the clearances, getting marks inside-50. But they probably were well on top from that point to the end?
Luke Beveridge: Yeah. Although, they were on top in different areas, there’s no doubt about that, and probably the two sort of aspects of the game when you look at the Champion Data lines and if you look at how they exited their rebound 50s and us being able to contain that or disallow (a) lot of uncontested marks was a problem for us in the game. Whether it was their out-number in those situations and then having the ball in their hands for too long and that causes some issues, and then on the flip side at times our template to nail our ball movement and what we've been doing up until today's game through the preseason – a couple games against Hawthorn. We look pretty good in transition, on counter offence out of our defensive area. But it's still too much today and there was a bit of a disconnect and a void through the middle of the ground, we were spread too far. And it made it difficult because we didn't win the battle around the source and they put better pressure on us than what we put on them. So, the most disappointing part other than them probably having a dominance in some of their flow at times was that we obviously kicked some points at the start of that last quarter (when) were well in it. And then for the margin to blow out by another five goals, and that's really what we've spoken about post-game, is the most frustrating part after working so hard to get to this point and feeling like we really prepared well for Round 1. That was the most disconcerting part of the afternoon.
Q: What do you pinpoint? I know it’s very early, straight after the game? Fitness? Was it heads dropping? Like, Melbourne ran over the top of you at the end.
LB: There's a number of things. It's probably a collection of some of the things you mentioned. But I wouldn't pinpoint one of them.
Q: You mentioned the uncontested marks. I think Melbourne took 50 above the AFL average today, it was something like 129. Obviously it’s still early in the season, but is that obviously a big sort of thing to focus on?
LB: You know, sometimes teams can do that. Teams can do that and their territory game isn't where they would like it to be, but there's wasn't really like that. They weren't chipping it around with width plays. They were getting through us on skinny and short diagonals, which usually we're better at defending. So, look, we know exactly what went wrong there. As I said, the density through the middle of the ground and being able to tease out the ones that ultimately you can still defend, we just weren't anywhere near what we've been able to execute. So, it's not an easy fix 'cause it takes a lot of work, but as a group and as a team, we know we're more capable than that.
Q: Luke, can I ask you about the decision to make Caleb Daniel the sub as well as leaving Jack Macrae out even though he’d had those multiple games back (from injury)?
LB: Yeah, Jack’s had two (games) back. One he stepped through gingerly and then he was pretty good the other day. So with Jacko he had a sort of a stress-related (injury) through his femur concern over the pre season; he worked really hard in his off season, and then he had that hamstring that he went down with and he missed quite a bit of training and running and his capacity to cover the ground needs to be there. You know? I felt like their midfield were able to do that better than us today. So, we just wait until Jack’s totally ready to perform at his absolute best with the ground cover and so he's not far away and yeah, CD? Yeah, in the roles and responsibilities he plays all of them pretty well and with the pre-season some of the guys have had, they weren't at their best today. Some of the boys have been at the top of their game really in recent times and some of them will be frustrated by their performance today. He's just found himself out of the team, so this is just part of it and ultimately the team and our ambition, we pick it with a view to challenge the whole competition, and I felt today going into the game that we might really challenge Melbourne with our run and getting across the ground and it was a little bit of a surprise that we weren't able to do that so we’ll process that during the week.
Q: So we expect to see Jack McRae playing next? I know you said he’s not far away, but it’s probably too early for selection sort of things?
LB: Too early. We’ll work through that during the week.
Q: What about (Caleb) Daniel? Does he play a full game next week?
LB: Ah, we’ll see.
Q: Ryley Sanders was the one subbed out Any injury there? Was it tactical?
LB: Nah, he’s fine. I mean, at that point in time is one of probably a handful that could have come off for the experience and stability in the team. Yeah, Ryley’s going really well. He's going to be a tremendous player for the club. He's still learning, but he was the one, and ultimately as a game transitions on and the minutes expire, there's no benefit of hindsight. So, we’ll look after him and make sure he heads into next week with a positive mindset.
Q: Buku (Khamis) was one of the bright spots today. Did a pretty good job on Ben Brown, I thought. What did you make of his performance?
LB: Yeah, Buku was OK. I mean the challenge for those keys (defenders) is they’re out there a long time and it probably told a little bit in the last quarter with a couple of those skill errors offensively and again I reckon Melbourne kicked six to eight goals from just blatant turnovers, which again, we've felt like we're in a good place with. So yeah, we gotta tidy that up. It's just something that you can't give any opposition that opportunity and we gave him too many easy ones.
Q: Is that why Sanders was subbed out? He’d only just had his fourth turnover not long before that.
LB: Yeah, it was just it was a coincidence. Definitely not the reason.
Q: Luke, can I ask about the score review system? It really seems to have come into sharp focus today. From my eyes looked almost all of them just unnecessary. Five in the first half, four in the first quarter. How did you see it? Were you frustrated by it, and what can be done about it?
LB: Ah look, I'm trying not to. I'd rather not comment too much. I think when they go to score review, I'm a bit apathetic towards it. I try and tune out and focus on probably what's going to happen after the reviews finished more than anything. So yeah, you notice it, but if it's topical then, as I said, I'm pretty neutral on it.
Q: Were you at all, obviously a sensational player, but were you at all surprised of the level Clayton Olliver was at today? He looked unplayable at a couple of moments.
LB: Oh well I think all the stuff and spoken about with our inability to stop chains and stop some of their slower build up. Clayton’s a very good stoppage player as well but it fuelled again for him as well and I'm not surprised. He's a great player. But ultimately, I think when a mix from the opposition has some impetus and some momentum in the game, there's always someone from that mix that's going to possibly get off the chain and when you're chasing score, you make that decision around negating and striking a balance offensively and we couldn't get the balance totally right today.
Q: Sam Darcy, where does he sort of fit in right now? Are you seeing him as a key forward/ruck who is competing with Rory Lobb? Is he down back? Where does he exactly fit?
LB: Yeah, he's building up his match time Sam. He played a lot of minutes again yesterday, so we're preparing him to most likely be a ruck-forward over time and as I said, if we pick too many of the keys and rucks, it means our run and what the competition is challenging it with is compromised. So, we'll work through that during the week.
Q: Lachie Bramble, a pretty good first up, performance for you guys?
LB: Yeah, I think so. I mean, Lachy...the stuff that Lachie’s doing for us is really encouraging, and so if there's a shining light probably offensively and he had his moments defensively where he was pretty strong, it's an encouraging performance from Lach.”
Q: Any injury concerns? I know Harvey (Gallagher) got tested out at one point but went back on.
LB: Yeah, he seems to be fine, Anna, so that's always a plus when you come out of a game and you haven't got too much turmoil or anything to worry about there. I think most of the boys have come through OK.
Q: What did you have of Harvey’s game on debut today? Got a nice goal in the first quarter
LB: Yeah I think he had his moments “Gags”, Harvey. He played on the wing for most of the day and there wasn't a lot of possession from the wingers in the game from either side, but we switched him in that inside brigade in the last quarter. I felt he did some really good things in that last quarter, so now it's about building up experience and exposure, and he went OK.