Luke Beveridge said he won’t be muzzling his players from publicly courting rival stars, insisting it’s not his style to clamp down on ambition, even if he’s not getting caught up in the recruitment chatter himself.
The Western Bulldogs coach was responding to captain Marcus Bontempelli’s recent comments about his admiration for Port Adelaide’s Zak Butters, a childhood Dogs fan and one of the league’s top midfielders.
Butters remains contracted at Alberton until the end of 2026, but that hasn’t stopped Bontempelli from floating the idea of a future partnership.
“I love watching him as a footballer,” Bontempelli said earlier this week. “If we happen to end up in the same team, I’d be pretty happy about that too.”
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“I can’t stop our players expressing their desire”
Beveridge was pragmatic when asked whether the club’s public pursuit of Butters might ruffle feathers. “I can’t stop our players talking about who they would like to have as teammates,” he said on Thursday.
“But I’ve got a personal approach… as far as a player like Zak, who every club has a great opinion of, I don’t want to be over the top with anything in regards to him. He’s still contracted, the ball is in Port Adelaide’s court.”
While off-field speculation bubbles, the Bulldogs face an uphill task to make the finals. Beveridge acknowledged defensive lapses have hurt them, but pushed back at the idea it’s a systemic flaw.
“If I asked you who was the best defensive team on aggregate going into last year’s finals series... it was us,” he said. “Has our philosophy changed? Absolutely not. The execution is the responsibility of all of us.”