Captain Marcus Bontempelli has acknowledged the Bulldogs’ start to the 2023 season is far from ideal.
Bontempelli addressed reporters on Monday morning, following the Dogs’ 51-point defeat to St Kilda over the weekend.
“As a team and as a football club, we’re not where we want to be right now at this point in time,” he said.
“I think the first point is always acknowledging and owning that. We are better, are capable of a lot more and need to be better.
“We’ve got to own up to our performances so far, and work through a solution-based process. You can’t go past the simple facts of intensity, the contest – basically the fundamentals of the game, I think we’re not executing well enough.
“Those are the key sort of pillars and cornerstones of your football club that you need to get right, in order to really allow the rest of your system and style of play to come together.
“The fortunate thing is that we don’t have too long to wait to get another chance, but it’s unfortunate that we’re here for a second week in a row, feeling like we’ve underperformed and haven’t been at our best.”
The Dogs have a five-day break before their round three clash, hosting Brisbane on Thursday night at Marvel Stadium.
Bontempelli said there will be a strong focus on the basics, which once executed effectively, will provide a platform for the team to build on.
“I think we need to strip things back to a couple of key aspects of the game that are super important. We need to hone in on that and build from there,” he said.
“I don’t think you can try and fix everything all at once. It needs to be a really simple focus.
“We’ve got a really skilful team – we just need to get back to that and let the more systematic things about our game flow from there.
“From a structural and style-of-play point of view, I think our brand does stack up – but it can’t if we’re not taking care of the football and contest (side of things). We’ve got to build from that point.”
Despite the external criticism, Bontempelli will keep a positive mindset heading into the Thursday night clash.
“Monday is a fresh start, a fresh week. We’ve only got a couple of days to process things and really move on, and that’s the benefit of short breaks and turnarounds,” he said.
“Physically you might hope for a day or two more at different points, but definitely from a mental perspective – off the back of a really poor performance on the weekend – we don’t have to wait too long before we can start executing things better.
“Obviously we own the fact we haven’t been good enough, but you can’t dwell on the emotions and the past. We have to look to the future and attack the week with energy and a positive outlook.
“That’ll be my messaging and my attitude – that’s the part you can control.”
Bontempelli also had a strong message following the racial remarks aimed at Jamarra Ugle-Hagan during the round two match.
“The main thing in all of this, as well as calling out this disgusting behaviour, is making a point that it’s not acceptable,” he said.
“It’s a simple message. This can’t keep happening – it has to stop.
“I’ll support Jamarra in his career, in his life – this football club will do that for all of our people, and for everyone particularly in a scenario like this.
“He’s a young person. He’s learning a lot about his football and about his career, but this isn’t something he should be (going through) as part of his journey.”
