The Caleb Conundrum - How? Why? And Where To From Here?

50 games ago, Caleb Daniel was walking off the Optus Stadium turf, standing on the edge of football immortality.

It was half-time in the 2021 Grand Final, and after a shaky start, the Western Bulldogs rallied strongly in the second term, kicking six goals to one, and turned a 21-point quarter-time deficit into an eight-point lead at the main break.

Daniel, 25 years of age at the time, was instrumental in the Bulldog's fightback, collecting 26 touches in the first half alone, and controlling proceedings across the half-back line. His second Premiership was in sight, and he had genuine claims to the Norm Smith Medal.

Despite what transpired in the second half of that game, it would’ve been hard at the time to imagine a scenario in the following years where the Bulldogs made the conscious decision of leaving such a crucial creator out of the side.

Yet here we are.

On the surface, it looks like senior coach Luke Beveridge has finally lost the plot. We’re talking about one of the best users of the ball in the competition, who has achieved just about everything a player could hope to at this level. Daniel is a Premiership player, won the Charles Sutton Medal in 2020, achieved All-Australian honours the same year, and at just 27 years of age, is set to enter the prime years of his career. Yet this season, Beveridge has already named him sub twice (the final pre-season match against Hawthorn and Round 1 against Melbourne), and was subbed out of last Saturday’s game against Geelong.

However, to the trained Bulldog eye, this omission doesn’t come as a huge surprise. While fans were stunned to see him named as the sub in the club’s final pre-season match against Hawthorn, and although he didn’t name Daniel specifically, Beveridge was quick to explain that some of the club’s senior players were out of form, based on the intraclub matches played during the summer. As a result, fewer were surprised when the same thing happened in Round 1. While Daniel produced an encouraging cameo in that game, he failed to produce when given the chance to start in each of the following three weeks, leading to tonight’s omission.

So we can surmise that Daniel is probably out of form right now, and while it’s not ideal, it’s also not uncommon. He’s not the first player to fall out of form and he certainly won’t be the last. Yet this position we’re currently in has always felt more inevitable than Daniel returning to his best form. There must be something else at play that’s impacting things.

As it happens, Daniel is one of a couple of victims who have emerged from a summer of significant change at the Bulldogs. While a lot of the focus during the summer was on the changes that the club carried out in their off-field department, only now are we starting to uncover the on-field casualties.

Much has been made of the arrival of Daniel Pratt as the club’s new defensive coach – an area of the ground that the Bulldogs have largely struggled in over the past few seasons. Pratt has wasted no time implementing a new defensive system at the club, one that revolves around the ability to both defend and be able to intercept. While the new system has garnered early success in both being able to restrict opposition scores and seeing the Bulldogs’ intercept numbers improve, the necessary skillset required to hold a place in this current backline is not one that Daniel possesses.

Daniel is an adept user of the football, capable of creating numerous chains off the half-back line. And while it’s certainly a useful trait to have, it is being forsaken in exchange for players who can defend and intercept first. It is why the introduction of Buku Khamis and Lachie Bramble has been so successful, and why the likes of Liam Jones and Ed Richards have continued to excel in defence; they have the skillset required to succeed in Pratt’s defensive system.

Daniel, meanwhile, has never been a particularly defensive-minded footballer and has never been a renowned interceptor since his move into the backline in late 2018.

So, if holding onto his place in defence is out of the question under this current system, where else can Daniel play?

Perhaps in the midfield? We know Daniel has no issues winning the ball, he uses it well, being able to defend is not as crucial in a midfield spot, and adding another midfield rotation to the mix is always a good thing.

Whilst this is all true, we run into a problem here as well. As part of the summer overhaul that saw a new defensive coach and system, there is also a newly introduced directive to wave in the club’s next generations of midfielders, and fast-track their development by investing as many midfield minutes into them as possible. We’re seeing this through the likes of Ryley Sanders and Harvey Gallagher, who have each played in every game so far this year. Gallagher has already won a Rising Star nomination, while Sanders went at Pick 6 in last year’s draft, and has the potential to be one of the best midfielders in the competition.

So strong is this directive of developing young players, that even three-time All-Australian Jackson Macrae is being squeezed out of the midfield. If Macrae can’t even get his fair share of midfield time, you’d suspect that Daniel’s chances will be even slimmer. And don’t even think about the prospect of him taking over any of Marcus Bontempelli, Tom Liberatore, or Adam Treloar in that midfield combination.

So, Daniel has been squeezed out of the backline, and won’t get close to a look at it in the midfield, but how about a role up forward? One of the most difficult kicks in the game is the one that hits a target inside 50, and as we’ve established, Daniel’s strength is his ability to find teammates by foot. We also know that Daniel is a very accurate kick for goal, both from the set shot and in general play. He wouldn’t necessarily have to worry about actually defending as much, and there isn’t a glut of youngsters that the Bulldogs are trying to blood in that forward line. Could Daniel find a spot here?

Possibly, although it’s not as straightforward as it may seem on paper. If we break down the starting six in the Bulldogs’ current forward line, we can identify six unique roles, each requiring a specific skillset that’s different to what anyone else can supply in the forward line, and has generally been played by just one player so far this year:

- The Stay-At-Home Full-Forward: a tall option who operates largely inside-50 (Jamarra Ugle-Hagan)

- The Forward-Ruck: a tall option who plays mostly forward but occasionally provides relief in the ruck for Tim English (Sam Darcy)

- The Roaming Centre-Half Forward: a tall option who tends to roam further up the ground and helps to set up scoring chains (Aaron Naughton)

- The Undersized Full-Forward: a small option who can compete inside-50 both in the air and on the ground (Cody Weightman)

- The Crumbing Forward: a small option who stays at the ground level, relying on ground-ball gets to generate chances (Rhylee West)

- The Pressure Forward: a small option who leads the charge in pressuring and harassing the opposition (Laitham Vandermeer)

Realistically, which of these six roles can Daniel play? Certainly, we can rule out the three roles that require a tall forward, as well as the Undersized Full-Forward role, which would require him to be able to play tall.

It would be easy to identify Vandermeer as the weak link and the obvious candidate that Daniel should come in for, and many fans have called for this. However, the Pressure Forward requires a skillset that leans heavily on being able to apply defensive pressure on the opposition, and we’ve established that this doesn’t suit Daniel’s natural game when we assessed what he brings to the backline earlier.

Removing a player who does bring that forward pressure and not replacing him runs the risk of creating an imbalance in the forward line, and the flow-on effect on that can be hard to measure until we see it in play. While Vandermeer does have his critics, what he does bring to the side has its uses, and it is not easily replaced

That leaves the Crumbing Forward position. This role would suit Daniel better than any other in the forward line, allowing him to roam free and get creative, without needing to worry about playing tall or applying pressure. But would he do that job better than what West is doing right now? Possibly, but it’s hard to argue that Daniel would be that much better at the role than West that we instantly make the change.

Is a role up forward Caleb Daniel's best bet at re-establishing himself back into the senior side? Source: Getty Images

More likely, Daniel would need a seventh forward role to be established: The Creator. A player who plays between half-forward and midfield, linking up the two areas of the ground and helping to set up marking opportunities inside 50. Think along the lines of Gryan Miers; Daniel’s metrics would be based on creating chances rather than converting them.

That just leaves the ruck as the only spot left on the ground that we haven’t covered yet, and while Luke Beveridge has developed a reputation for perhaps being a little too inventive with player positioning over the past decade, even he wouldn’t contemplate throwing one of the smallest players in club history into the ruck.

On The Salty Bulldog podcast this week, I described Daniel as a rogue footballer; not because he isn’t following team instructions, but because he was running around without a defined role in the side. So what does he do to get back into the side? A strong performance for Footscray in the VFL today will help, but it may be that he has to adapt his skillset to fulfil a specific role in the current team system. It sounds daunting and perhaps unlikely, but it isn’t the first time Daniel has done this. He started as a half-forward/midfielder earlier in his career, before again finding himself out of the team after a drop-off in form. He worked on his game, forced his way back into the senior side, found a new role off the half-back line, and from there grew into one of the best back-flankers in the game.

It’s a shame that we’re in a position where a high-quality player is out of the side, but it’s a consequence of the changes that Bulldogs fans have been clamouring for over the last 24 months. And the fact that the club are prepared to make the necessary changes, and also put the team and its system ahead of high-profile individuals, can only be a good thing in the long term.