The Bulldogs have played five matches on April 10 and the most enjoyable of those — at least from a red, white and blue perspective — came on this day in 1976.
Footscray ventured to the MCG to take on the new 'glamour' team Melbourne. The Demons, with ex-Swans champion Bob Skilton at the coaching helm, had knocked off reigning premiers North Melbourne in the opening round of the season and were brimful of confidence.
Footscray, on the other hand, had suffered a heartbreaking one-point loss against Essendon in Round 1, having come within a whisker of reeling in a 46-point quarter-time deficit.
Keen to make amends, the Dogs scored heavily in the opening quarter but, unfortunately, so did Melbourne, and the Demons took a six-point advantage into the first break, leading 7.4 to 6.4.
But one thing the Bulldogs managed to do late in that first quarter was kick accurately. At the 17-minute mark, full forward Kelvin Templeton — who had been one of the Dogs' best in the previous week's loss with four goals — booted his second major of the afternoon, and it kicked off a run of 13 goals without a miss over the next 45 minutes.
With Gary Dempsey taking control in the ruck over the second and third terms, he gave an armchair ride to smaller men Geoff Jennings, Ray Huppatz, Stephen Power and Peter Featherby, who began to cut through Melbourne's forward line like the proverbial knife through hot butter.
When the three-quarter time siren sounded, Footscray was ahead by 40 points, and they closed out the match by kicking four goals to three in the last quarter to record a resounding 48-point win.
Templeton finished with six majors to add to his four in Round 1, and he would boot seven, four and five over the following three weeks to establish himself as one of the VFL's premier spearheads.
By year's end he had amassed 82 goals and was a big factor in the Bulldogs making finals for the second time in three years.
April the Tense!
In a bizarre statistical quirk, all four of the Bulldogs' matches played on April the 10 since that big 1976 win have been cliff-hangers decided by under a goal.
The Bulldogs came from behind to snatch victory against Fitzroy in 1993. With Simon Atkins and Tony Liberatore leading the way, the Dogs sneaked home by three points, 14.17.101 to 14.14.98.
Sadly, the next three April 10 matches were all heartbreakers. The Bulldogs kicked themselves out of it in 1994, losing to Collingwood 12.22.94 to 14.11.95, and they fell just short of Richmond on this day in 2005, going down 11.18.84 to 12.16.88.
Perhaps the most painful loss of all, though, came on this day four years ago when the final moments of the match against Hawthorn robbed the Dogs not only of victory, with James Sicily's mark and late goal giving the Hawks a three-point win, but also of skipper Bob Murphy, who tore his ACL in the marking contest with Sicily.
The Bulldogs of course went on to win a famous flag, but Murphy unfortunately had to celebrate from the sidelines.
