When Will Canterbury's Dog Days Finally Be Over?
By
Jason Oliver
It's getting to that time of year when the
Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs make the most of opposition teams checking out for the season and pick up a few wins.
They've made a habit out of finishing a season strong before starting the next with a lengthy losing streak and an abrupt end to any hopes of cracking the Top 8.
Currently at
86.1% to finish this season holding the wooden spoon with 14 losses in 16 games, 2021 has been much of the same.
However, 2022 could be a lot different.
Representative backline players and attacking stars of the game are on their way to Belmore and there's hope for a quick turnaround next season. Still, the Bulldogs first need to address what has gone wrong in 2021 if they're to provide the likes of Josh Addo-Carr, Matt Burton and Matthew Dufty a platform to attack from.
Where has it gone wrong?
The Bulldogs have offered little on both sides of the ball this season.
Their attack is the worst in the NRL. Remarkably, as the points pile up in the NRL and scoring trends upward, the Bulldogs are only scoring
11.8 points per game after managing
14.1 per game in 2020.
Two things contribute to Canterbury's lack of scoring more than anything else, and both are linked together: Yardage and ball-playing.
The Bulldogs average just
1,571 running metres per game. A lack of yardage has contributed to earning just
26.7 tackles inside the opposition 20-metre line per game -
10th in the NRL. A side that lacks individual attacking talent needs a lot more opportunities in good ball if they're to ensure the scoreboard ticks over.
While committing the fewest errors in the NRL (
8.8 per game) and playing with the competition's best completion rate (
80.5%) helps the Bulldogs maintain possession, they're not doing enough with it to trouble the opposition defensive line.
Top teams in the competition move the ball through the middle of the field and explore down the edges. Meanwhile, the Bulldogs average just
89.1 general play passes per game (
12th). They're not asking enough questions of the defence in exit sets or good ball sets, and it shows in their
16th-ranked
9.9 line engagements per game.
Kyle Flanagan was introduced to the side under the guise of being the long-term answer at halfback. Instead, he lasted just nine games before being dropped with his only game since coming in a 66-0 loss at the hands of the Sea Eagles.
While Flanagan hasn't done enough himself to be blameless, Canterbury's lack of ball-playing has been a significant contributor to his poor form. We only need to look back at Flanagan's form last season and how his slide coincided with Victor Radley's ACL injury to see how much he depended on a ball-playing middle to provide him with time and space further from the ruck.
He started the 2020 season well enough for
one journalist to claim Flanagan was "ahead of the great Cooper Cronk at the same points of their careers."
It's a ridiculous thing to say, but a sign of how well Flanagan had started the year, nonetheless. Radley tore his ACL two weeks later and Flanagan was dropped from the Roosters side a month after that. Fast-forward to 2021, and Canterbury's middle doesn't do nearly enough to compress the defence and move the ball. It's no coincidence that Flanagan, and the Bulldogs attack overall, has struggled to threaten through 17 rounds.
Josh Jackson is the only Bulldogs forward averaging more than five passes per game with 11 per game. But, if we look through some of the best attacking teams and their ball movement:
Storm - Welch (6 passes), Bromwich (5), Finucane (4)
Panthers - Yeo (13), Fisher-Harris (5)
Eels - Brown (10), Paulo (6)
Sea Eagles - Trbojevic (14), Taupau (5)
Not surprisingly, the Storm, Panthers and Eels also occupy the top three spots in the NRL for metres per game.
Canterbury's one-dimensional attack is holding them back all the way up the field to the point they're consistently kicking from inside their own half. Their
636.4 kicking metres per game is the most in the competition while the Bulldogs rank
13th in forced dropouts with only
1.3 per game.
The issues in yardage, ball-playing and, as a result, a poor attack, translate into a defence conceding
30.6 points per game. Never has a competent attack been so important to team defence than it is right now. With few relieving penalties or opportunities to perform the dark arts in the ruck, making the most of your time in possession is the key to success.
Trent Barrett and the Bulldogs have a lot of issues to work through, but they need to start by improving how they get up and down the field through the centre-third. They don't need to be expansive in their play. Rather, play out their current style further from the ruck to ensure they move the defence across the field. Figure out who can help in this department moving forward and recruit those that can fill the void.
Looking ahead to 2022
It has been about 2022 all year, really.
With Josh Addo-Carr, Brent Naden, Matt Burton and Matthew Dufty all on their way to the Bulldogs next season, there is light at the end of the tunnel.
All four players are excellent with the ball in hand. Outside of Naden - who has struggled for a place in the Panthers side for 2021 - each has displayed promising attacking form for their respective clubs this season.
However, the Bulldogs have done little to address the big issues through the middle of the field with their recruitment.
Thompson is a quality forward starting to find his feet. His
138 running metres per game and the occasional glimpses of ball-playing have flown under the radar while he plays within a poor pack. Ava Seumanufagai has played well enough to earn a contract extension with the club, while Raymond Faitala-Mariner will be building into 2022 when he returns from injury in the coming weeks.
Josh Jackson, Adam Elliott and Jack Hetherington are all returning as regular first-graders for next season.
But the Bulldogs are still short. Without an improvement through the centre-third and move towards a more mobile attack, those weapons arriving on the flanks in 2022 will only be able to do so much.
Dale Finucane is a rumoured target and would make a perfect addition. He's consistent, can move the football, and is active around the ball which will further help the Bulldogs yardage men who, right now, don't get up the field in pairs often enough.
Isaac Liu is one the Bulldogs missed out on for 2022, but John Asiata and Aaron Woods would provide value behind Finucane if they land him. In addition, Connor Watson and Tyrone Peachey are two options that can fill a ball-playing lock/utility role if Barrett really wants to adopt a fast and mobile approach moving forward.
The Bulldogs have the
fifth-easiest draw through to the end of the season. Having played well against the Roosters in Round 17, there is hope for the classic fast-finish to the end of a Bulldogs season. However, if it doesn't come with an improvement in the middle, it will more than likely be another fast-finish into a frustrating start to the following season.
Examples are few and far between, but this long-range effort in Round 11 is a prime example of what a middle forward engaging the line can do for an attack.
https://thumbs.gfycat.com/FlatNaughtyGreatwhiteshark-mobile.mp4
Averillo's offload and Dallin Watene-Zelezniak's quick hands are the major features of the highlight, but it's Elliott's run and engaging of the line that puts Averillo one-on-one with Brian Kelly to provide him with the opportunity to offload in the first place.
More recently, against the Roosters, the Bulldogs put together a set that should be on replay in the video room all week.
The two wingers make the most of Nick Meaney's kick return to get the Dogs 40 metres up the field. That provides Thompson with a chance to wind up at a slow defensive line. He picks out Sam Verrills sliding across from marker to promote a quick play-the-ball which allows Renouf Atoni to get in behind the ruck. The Bulldogs are all of a sudden 30 metres out. A Lachlan Lewis bomb puts Daniel Tupou under pressure, and the Roosters struggle to work out of their own end.
A Billy Smith error hands over possession. However, Jack Hetherington's fumble in the ruck off the scrum releases the pressure, and an opportunity goes begging for the Bulldogs.
Asking the 16th-placed team to perform these actions and execute them every time is setting them up for failure. But the Bulldogs don't need to score or turn every good set into points to begin working towards 2022.
If they can start to replicate the above actions more often and set the table for a spine that isn't going to blow the opposition away across the remaining eight rounds, the incoming attacking stars might have something to work with next season.
