Bulldogs AFL team outgunned by competition front-runner

The Gunnedah Bulldogs were no match for reigning premiers the Inverell Saints in round one of the North West AFL season, as the Saints inflicted a 124-point hiding at Varley Oval last Saturday.

The Bulldogs landed two early goals but found themselves 33 points behind at quarter-time, before trailing by 14 goals at half-time and eventually going down 24.18.162 to 5.8.38.

Shannon Wilson was Inverell’s leading scorer with nine goals, while Kyle Payne was the next best with seven.

Player-coach Jakob Vearing kicked two majors for Gunnedah while Daniel Pass, Eamon Martin and Lachlan Hills landed one apiece.

Bulldogs captain Darcy Hill said “I guess you could say that” it was a reality check.

“It’s always a tough ask travelling up there, especially when you’re playing the reigning premiers on a home deck that’s a bit of a fortress for them,” he said.

While noting that the Bulldogs had had a few pre-season matches, Hill said “we ran into a team that was a bit more well-prepared and ready to go than we were on the day”.

Hill said the Bulldogs started pretty well but that once the Saints buckled down, played to their strengths and had their game plan, “we sort of failed to respond and match their level”.

“There were definitely good passages in terms of effort and I guess you could say skill as well,” he said.

“It’s just sort of putting that all together and giving it a full game and then hopefully we can match teams like Inverell with a bit more skill and experience to us, if just sort of put in those patches together, hopefully we can match it for longer periods of the game.”

Hill said the Saints were good at “getting numbers to the contest and being physical at the ball”, after Vearing had said beforehand that Inverell was very physical and “hunted in packs”.

“I think one positive you could say is that it’s probably as difficult as it’s going to get, you’d hope for the season; a round one trip away to play the reigning premiers,” Hill said.

“In that case I’d say it’s probably a positive, but also now we can identify exactly where we’ve gone wrong in that game and what we need to improve on.”

Hill said some of Gunnedah’s best players were younger players playing out of position and still acquiring skill, while a few first-choice players were missing from the backline.

This Saturday the Bulldogs trek to Tamworth to contest the Kangaroos, who are coming off an 8.10.58 to 5.10.40 win against the New England Nomads.

It was the first time in 627 days that the Kangaroos won a North West AFL first grade fixture.