Bontempelli: The area of concern the Dogs have addressed

Western Bulldogs captain Marcus Bontempelli has identified the one area of concern that must be fixed in order for his club to truly contend.

The Dogs had no trouble scoring in 2025, evidenced by their 2493 points at an average of 108.4 - ranked No.1 in the league - during the home and away season.

They conceded 1820 points at an average of 79 points which ranked eighth in the competition, but they gave up scores of 100 or more in losses to finalists on five occasions among their nine defeats (all to top eight sides).

It was enough to see them narrowly miss finals and had many critics wondering if they will become a premiership threat given their at times flaky defence.

But Bontempelli insists Luke Beveridge and his coaches have been tweaking and implementing this off-season in a bid to address their deficiencies.

“The problems that affected us especially in the last game (against Fremantle) and in the most important games had been there throughout the course of the season,” ‘The Bont’ told SEN’s Whateley.

“It’s easy to say, ‘Why weren’t you able to change it?’, but it is always difficult in-season to either retool or fix parts of the game that teams have been able to assess as challenges for us.

“Ultimately we didn’t have too many issues scoring at times with a strong front half, and a midfield group that could provide territory and enough opportunities inside 50.

“It was really when the ball came back the other way we weren’t able to defend definitely the better teams with their transition and scoring.

“That’s something we know and we’ve worked on and tried to implement one or two new things to help us maximise that part of our game. I still look at the games that we lost, there weren’t any great or significant margins. So I think we’re hopefully looking at something that is a small gain but if we can find an extra 10 or 20 per cent it can make our game and profile that much better.

“But all that stuff is talk and talk is cheap until we get out there and start playing and implementing the things we’ve been trying to improve.”

The Dogs were unable to lure an established key defender to The Kennel in the off-season despite “shaking a few trees”. They did add the 175cm Connor Budarick from the Gold Coast Suns which will help in the small to medium department.

However, Bontempelli is confident they can upskill what is currently at the club to help fill that apparent void. He also called on his fellow midfielders and those up forward to pull together and defend as one.

“There’s been some growth. James O’Donnell is a guy very early in his career and has certainly improved craft and size across the pre-season,” the Dogs skipper added.

“The club went looking and tried to shake a few trees to see what would fall. In the end I think we always had to know that the guys, regardless of what happened across the off-season, we still needed to improve aspects of our defence whether that be individuals, or as a midfield and forward line and how we assist our team defence.

“A lot of teams treat it that way. You don’t just rely on the six blokes behind you to stop an onslaught of goals, it has to be systematic.

“The approach was always going to be the same - ‘How could we improve our defence systematically?’ - and if we added personnel, which we did although it wasn’t a big guy in Connor Budarick.

“I think he’s going to end up being a great get and a really valuable player for us in that small/medium position. As much as there was no hulking full-back that came in, I do believe the tweaks we have made will help improve us.

“And we just continue to assess the market as time goes on.”

The pressure is on for the Dogs to make their presence felt in season 2026 given they possess a strong playing list and have been thereabouts in recent years.

Bontempelli feels that expectation but insists the group is in a good space to deliver.

“I’m excited about this group,” he said.

“There’s some great youth in it, there’s been some great growth across a few seasons, but particularly and hopefully the off-season and pre-season to allow us to take that next step we’ve been yearning for the last couple of seasons.”

Bont, Beveridge and co. meet Hawthorn in the AAMI Community Series at Whitten Oval on Friday night from 7:10pm AEDT

They’ll kick off their 2026 campaign proper against back-to-back premiers the Brisbane Lions at the Gabba on Saturday, March 7.