Western Bulldogs – 19.19 (133)
Hawthorn – 6.9 (45)
A dominant Bulldogs outfit slaughtered a second-rate Hawks outfit who much like most of this year, are a shadow of the premiership team from last year.
The first half was as good for the Bulldogs as it was bad for the Hawks with the amazing score line of 88 points to a meagre 4 points.
Big moment
It was a rare calamitous forward-50 entry from the Bulldogs with a lot of over possession between Scott Welsh and Jason Akermanis in the first quarter in which their best to not score a goal. In the end , it was a toe-poke that went through the goals by Akermanis in a way that showed how the night was going to continue for the Bulldogs.
Key Players for the Western Bulldogs
Adam Cooney – The Brownlow medallist had an excellent game, with most of his disposals behind the ball setting up the play.
Matthew Boyd – Killed it’ in the midfield with 35 possessions to be the most dominant player in the middle of the ground.
Ryan Hargrave – Picked up possessions at will, not only in the backline, but all over the ground whilst continuing his excellent attacking form.
Ryan Griffin – An excellent smother to save a sure goal when the Bulldogs were 80 points up’ typified his work-rate in the game, finishing with 31 polished possessions.
Brian Lake – Absolutely dominated Franklin whilst providing his typical set-ups from the backline that allowed the Bulldogs to go from end-to-end so easily.
Key Players for Hawthorn
Luke Hodge – A one man show and probably the only player that deserves to be included in the Hawks best players.
He was put in the middle in the start of the 2nd term (when the score line was 60 to 2) and was clearly the Hawks only effective midfielder. Easily his best game of the year.
Daylight…..
Sam Mitchell – Tried, tried and tried again to no avail. Not his best game but as usual, it wasn’t through a lack of effort. More due to a lack of help.
Brad Sewell – Same old story. Exactly the same as Mitchells game.
Musings from the match
• The likes of Brad Johnson, Jarrod Harbrow, Lindsey Gilbee and Scott Welsh were also excellent for the Bulldogs.
• Western Bulldogs were unbelievable in the first-half. Probably the best football anyone has played all year.
• Their skills, marking, running and pressure made them untouchable as you can see by the scoreboard.
• Their movement of the ball from the backline to the forward line was awesome to watch at times.
• A heap of the Bulldogs goals came from kicks and marks to leading players as opposed to Hawthorn who kept kicking to a stationary one-on-one contest.
• Surprisingly, the Hawks only had 7 less inside-50s than the Bulldogs.
• The Bulldogs had an amazing 15 scoring shots from 15 inside-50s in the first quarter.
• The Bulldogs pressure was sensational, forcing the Hawthorn players to take the shorter option whilst selling themselves into trouble.
• Due to that pressure, the Hawks couldn’t use the longer option up the field which for most of the time was available.
• At one time in the 2nd quarter, it took 4 risky-kicks for the Hawks to get the ball out of their backline.
• To say that the Hawks are missing Cyril Rioli and Clinton Young is a massive understatement.
• Not much pace there; their midfield is the slowest in the AFL.
• Lance Franklin had a shocker, having no impact up forward only to be sent to the backline as the free-player to get his hands on the ball.
SuperCoach news
The Bulldogs scored well as you would expect with 11 players with 100+ scores as opposed to the Hawks who only had Luke Hodge.
Brad Johnson was the highest scorer on the ground with 153pt’s thanks to 11 marks, 23 possession, 3 goals and 4 assists.
SuperCoach scores and game stats from the SuperFooty match center
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