Internal belief has been the key to the Western Bulldogs rise in 2015, according to veteran Matthew Boyd.

The Bulldogs currently sit fifth after notching up their 11th win against Essendon on Sunday and have surprised the football world with their rise up the ladder.

However internally, the improved performance has come as no surprise says Boyd.

“We’ve seen over the course of the pre-season and even in stages last year that we’d taken steps forward, so it’s really no surprise to us that we’re playing good footy because we’ve seen a progression over a sustained period of time.

“It’s more of a surprise to the outside world where we’re at but we have a strong belief in what we’re able to do and the way we’re able to play when we get it right for four quarters.”

The Bulldogs have been able to do exactly that in their last two matches against Collingwood and Essendon and put in back-to-back four quarter efforts.

“We can only do what we can do, play our way and play with good energy and good intensity and I think we were able to do that for four quarters on the weekend which is a really positive sign for us.

“For a couple of weeks there we probably weren’t playing to the standard that we wanted to and I think last week against Collingwood we were able to take a good step forward in putting a good solid four quarter performance together and again consolidated on the weekend with another four quarter performance.”

With two wins on the trot, the prospect of finals football looms for the Bulldogs, but Boyd was quick to note that the Bulldogs had not yet earned that right yet.

“I think a key factor to finals success is winning enough games to get there so we haven’t done that yet.

“That’s the goal obviously to keep on progressing and keep winning games.”