AYCE Cordy was "angry", "upset" and "devastated" after being overlooked for selection in the Western Bulldogs' season-opener against West Coast.

But the 21-year-old's emphatic response in the VFL over the past fortnight has earned him a senior promotion and greater respect at Whitten Oval.

Cordy has been named on the interchange bench for Saturday night's clash with St Kilda at Etihad Stadium.

It will be the young forward/ruckman's third AFL game - having played in rounds 22 and 23 last year - and it has taken longer to eventuate than he had hoped.

All pre-season Cordy had been locked in a battle with close mate Jordan Roughead for the job to partner the Bulldogs' No.1 ruckman Will Minson. (Of course, all along there had also been the less-likely possibility of all three playing in the same side, as will be the case against the Saints.)

Cordy had finally developed enough strength to arrest his ongoing issues with his shoulders (which have undergone multiple reconstructions), and had conquered the self-doubts he'd had about whether his body would ever be able to withstand the rigours of AFL football.

He had enjoyed his first injury-free summer since joining the Bulldogs as a first-round (No. 14) father-son pick in the 2008 NAB AFL Draft. Of course, it had helped that in that period he had transformed himself from a twig-like 73 kilograms into a 100-kilogram monster.

Cordy played every pre-season match and showed glimpses of why many at the club believe he will become a high-quality, 10-year player. Dogs fans were excited by his improved contested marking and obvious footy smarts, along with the exceptional agility and slickness of movement for his 203 centimetres.

Dogs coach Brendan McCartney (who Cordy credits with helping him enjoy the game again) was particularly taken with Cordy's inspired final quarter against North Melbourne in the NAB Cup game at Ballarat, praising his "knack of making teammates around him look better".

Remarkably, McCartney, a former teaching colleague and friend of Cordy's parents Brian and Karen in Geelong, had visited the couple in hospital on August 6, 1990, to congratulate them on the birth of Ayce.

However, the family link certainly didn’t win Cordy any favours at the selection table. McCartney delivered the bad news.

"It wasn't a very long conversation," Cordy told AFL.com.au on Tuesday. "Brendan just said, 'We're not going with you this weekend. You'll be playing in the VFL."

"I was pretty angry, pretty upset, so I didn’t have much to say. I just nodded, bowed my head and started to move on … (I was) hugely disappointed … (and) a pretty devastated bloke.

"I knew that I couldn’t control that and had to respond in the VFL on the weekend. I had something to prove. I really thought I'd earned my spot for round one, so I felt that when I went back to the VFL I really had to make a statement."

Just two days later, Cordy turned his anger into performance fuel - he starred with four first-half goals in Williamstown's narrow win over the Northern Blues at Visy Park.

"I can’t complain (about) my form. It's a lot better than it has been the previous three years," he said. "I'd like to hope that when I finally get my chance I can make an impact."

His competition with Roughead for the back-up ruck role has been as tough emotionally as it has been physically. They were junior basketball teammates, were drafted at the same time and have lived together ever since.

"It's a difficult one when you’re competing for the (same) spot, but at the same time we're very supportive of one another and always looking to help each other out," Cordy said.

"And big Will (Minson), to his credit, is much the same. He's sort of our mentor and has been since day one. We're a pretty tight-knit group."

Cordy is optimistic about the Dogs' three-ruckmen experiment. He realises he is the third big-man option but believes he can play as a permanent forward.

He models himself on Kurt Tippett, the similarly sized Adelaide Crows forward-ruckman.

"He's very impressive up forward and then he goes into the ruck and gives a good, honest contest every time," he said. "If I can get half as good as him, I think I'll do all right at AFL level."

Cordy does better than "all right" at academic level, and in fact is challenging Minson's status as the dux of the club. In his final year at Geelong College, he won two science awards and achieved an ENTER result of 97.4. He is now in his third year of a biomedicine degree at Melbourne University, where Minson is studying civil engineering.

"Me and Will bump into each other every now and then at university," he said. "I think it's quite a funny sight - we're both about two heads' taller than everyone else.

"It's an interesting off-field relationship we've got. He's actually tutoring me a little bit with my maths."

Numbers are important to Cordy, who wears the No. 49 his father donned in 124 games for the Bulldogs from 1981-88. (His uncles Neil and Graeme Cordy also played for the club, with Neil finishing his 235-game career in Sydney.)

One piece of fatherly advice stands out: "Just give it everything you've got. It doesn’t matter about (the) result, it doesn’t matter about one contest, always move on to the next one."

In the past fortnight, perhaps more than ever, Cordy has best exemplified what his father has long preached.