Dogs keep finals flame alight

Western Bulldogs   141 defeated Collingwood   100

The Western Bulldogs have kept their unlikely finals hopes alive with a 41-point win over a Collingwood outfit with nothing to play for but a priority pick at Telstra Dome tonight.

For the Bulldogs to make the eight, they need St Kilda to beat Brisbane, Fremantle to defeat Port Adelaide and Essendon to beat Melbourne.

The Bulldogs’ greatest ever first quarter against the Magpies set up the victory, with the Dogs kicking nine goals to two in the first term to seemingly end the contest by quarter time.

But Collingwood first stemmed the flow of Bulldog goals then ate into the substantial margin to get within 20 points in the final quarter, before Rodney Eade’s charges settled and kicked the five of the last seven majors.

Scott West was best-on-ground for the Bulldogs with 36 possessions and two goals, and was supported by Matthew Robbins and Brad Johnson who kicked five and six goals respectively.

Collingwood skipper Nathan Buckley was one of the few Pies to stand out, with three goals and 25 disposals. Paul Licuria was prolific with 35 possessions and Jason Cloke worked hard as a target up forward with two goals.

In Shane Woewodin’s 200th (and possibly last) game, Collingwood made two late changes: Harry O’Brien and ruckman David Fanning were replaced by Ryan Lonie and Chris Egan.

Chris Grant opened the scoring in the first minute, and the Bulldogs kicked the next two without much opposition. Buckley then got the Magpies’ first, but the Dogs slammed on another three majors and it looked like a 100-point smashing was on the cards when Collingwood went into the quarter-time huddle 44 points in arrears.

The Pies slowly turned the tide in the second term, but missed seven shots on goal (only kicking two majors) while the Bulldogs managed to snag three goals to maintain a 46-point advantage going into the major break.

West had already garnered 22 touches in the middle for the Bulldogs up to half-time, while Buckley was Collingwood’s everywhere man with 15 possessions and a goal playing up forward and in the middle.

Brad Johnson kicked the first goal of the third term to take the lead to 52 points, but the Pies kicked the next three straight goals and six of the next eight to force a contest – the Bulldogs only led by 26 points at the last change.

Collingwood responded to Robbins’ fifth goal at the start of the final stanza with two of their own to bring the margin back to 20 points, and Eade was having a fit in the Bulldogs’ coaches box.

But the Bulldogs kicked five of the next six goals to ease away to a comfortable win before Scott Burns kicked a goal after the siren for the Pies, who will now at least end up with picks two and four in the national draft.

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