Players are often urged to learn from their experiences and utility Shaun Higgins is confident the Western Bulldogs’ recent close contests will further drive his teammates to continue to improve this season.
The Bulldogs past three games have been decided by less than three goals and the 26-year-old said the team was getting better at handling the pressure associated with close finishes.
“No doubt we’ve been more competitive [this year] but having said that, once you show that, you want to show more of it,” Higgins said.
“I think at times we’ve probably let ourselves down… not being able to stand up the way we want to play throughout the whole game and that’s probably cost us those couple of games.
“On the whole, I still think there are good signs that we’ll hopefully build on in the second half of the year.”
Higgins said the young side’s ability to hang in there against Melbourne was pleasing and it had provided a confident boost for the 12th placed Bulldogs.
“We thought that was a really good win to stand up and just really grind one out,” he said.
“With a young group all you want to see is that you can learn from those games and I think that we showed a small part of that against Melbourne and will continue to build.”
Another opportunity to win the four points presents itself against the Gold Coast this weekend and Higgins said his teammates were primed and ready for the task.
“I think they’ve shown enough so far this year to show us all that they are going to be a really good side and probably quicker than maybe than we first thought,” he said.
“We will go into it, do our homework and look forward to a really good clash this weekend.”
