Star midfielder Marcus Bontempelli doesn’t believe a change of plan is required for the Western Bulldogs to bounce back in 2019.

The 23-year-old says the Dogs will trust their process, as they look to build on their eight wins in 2018 and move up the ladder this year.

“There’s been no real overhaul to be honest,” Bontempelli told SEN Breakfast.

“I think we know that what we’ve done and what we’ve been able to do in the past has worked for us, and particularly we look at later in last season as a good case study for us.

“In our last four games we were able to put a couple of wins together and I think our typical style that we’ve come to know ourselves when we play well is we’re good inside the contest, our hands are sharp and we move the ball with speed.

Bontempelli believes if the Dogs can fine-tune that plan, and get it right on game day, that they will be more than competitive.

“I think that will be the way we probably look again in this season coming and hopefully we’ll be able to cut teams up a little bit more than we were able to last year,” he said.

“I think you’ll see some speed in our ball movement, but also a recognition of when we’ve got to slow the ball movement and just rest and recharge the batteries so we can go again.”

It’s been a relatively smooth pre-season for Bontempelli, who will use the AFLX tournament next week as part of his road to round one.

He acknowledged that being able to string together high-quality, consistent training sessions through the pre-season had been important.

“It’s always nice when you can get a clean pre-season without too many issues or niggles or injuries, so most of it is probably just being able to be out there as much as I can,” he said.

“I feel like across the board, the group’s really attacked this pre-season well. Some of the training sessions and the volume of running and what not that we’ve been able to get in has been a real positive.

“I’m content and I’m positive about where the group sits now as we head closer and closer towards the season.”