Your such a drama queen!! I cant believe you are so doom and gloom. I know you havnt been a dogs fan for very long, but give ot another 20 odd years and you will come to realise that we are never down for long. We will bounce back strongly next year, mark my words.
Kasiano had no passion whatsoever this year!! I cant believe you putting his name in that sentence. He was soul less.
We have so many good forwards coming through the ranks, so we will be more then fine.
And for gods sake, can you please stop moaning about Ennis. He left years ago!!
Perhaps if by some rediculous amount of bad luck we have a terrible year, perhaps you can go and support another team instead of insisting how terrible and soul less our team is!!
I agree with most of that. We have lost two of our most passionate players in Graham and Reynolds. Although Graham has put a lid on his fiery nature for a couple of seasonsin order to avoid upsetting the oversensitive referees. Kasiano only showed very rare glimpses that he wanted to be out there and as a whole the team never looked fired up last year, or at least not very often. And it's no use crying over players who have moved on regardless of how good they were for us. I've seen plenty of new players step into the NRL and repay the faith of their coach by giving it their all. Sometimes that youthful exuberance can also help to inspire the established players on to greater efforts.
Back on topic, we rarely have struggled to have reasonable forwards, and good ones coming through the grades. We have a coach who used to be a Bulldogs forward now too. I don't think it will be an issue. Plenty of depth
We've let some good young forwards go in the last few years because our established pack and a coach that seemed reluctant to blood youth when players lost some form dictated that incumbents were going to be in the side until they were physically incapable of taking the field. So it will be interesting to see who among our young forwards can get a look in this year. It's an exciting time to be a Bulldogs fan because we might get to see some prospects earn their stripes.
I'm a drama queen?? No I'm assessing the situation objectively and practically.. You my friend, are a dreamer.
These new blokes coming through the ranks have either
1) less experience or
2)less affiliation with the club so less passion
Youve underestimated how important it is for a team at this level to have players who'll go above n beyond being skilled or fast or strong
This level of football requires maturity with passion that you don't get from new upcoming players (no matter how fast or strong they are)
I'm sad to see some of our established players depart too. But I agree with Flambouyant about it not being all doom and gloom. Sometimes what you lose in experience can be more than made up for with youthful enthusiasm and a desire for youngsters to climb up the pecking order through performing strongly. I am old enough now to remember seeing the team go through a few rebuilds. As far as things stand this year. I'd say that we've got a good mix of highly experienced forwards, players who have been knocking on the door of being established squad members through having filled in at various stages and promising youngsters who will bust their asses to be the players that fill in the gaps created by the departures of incumbents.
It's not a terrible situation to be in. Over the next couple of years we'll see some quality emerge at the club in various positions if Pay is a worthy coach.