With this year’s crop of young talent touted as one of the best in years, the Western Bulldogs are in the market to select one of the nation’s best talents at November’s NAB AFL Draft.
The Bulldogs currently hold a first round selection – pick seven, as well as picks 27, 32, 45, 63, 75 and 82 for the Draft, which will be held over two days on November 22 and 23.
“Pick seven is a very good pick in any draft, but this draft in particular has got a really good top end,” said Bulldogs’ General Manager of List and Recruiting, Sam Power.
“We’re really confident we’ll get a good player at pick seven.”
TRADE WRAP – WHAT CAME IN, WHAT WENT OUT, AND WHAT DOES IT ALL MEAN?
Now that the NAB Trade Period has finished, Power said the Club’s attention would now turn to the draft. For the first time, picks can be traded between clubs from now until November 16, then during the NAB AFL Draft event itself.
“There’s a lot of planning for the draft over the next month, really going over all the data that we have on all the young talent coming through the system and finalising our talent order there,” Power said.
“Clubs will be pretty active during this period. We’ll be doing everything we can to keep on strengthening our draft position going into November 22.”
The Dogs landed two experienced players from other clubs in the trade period – Sam Lloyd crossed from Richmond and Taylor Duryea arrived from Hawthorn.
“Sam, in particular, was someone we identified really early in the year for his ability to play up forward and hit the scoreboard, but also play through the midfield and provide another option through there,” Power said.
“Taylor’s been very durable, he’s played a lot of games at his time at Hawthorn. They’re really good characters and they’ll be fantastic for our culture at the club.”
Power said while it was disappointing to lose Jordan Roughead and Marcus Adams through trades, the Club remains in a strong position heading into the draft.
“In Marcus’ case, he had two years on a contract and we were keen to keep him. We were only going to do that trade if it was a really compelling offer, which it was,” he said.
“That’s allowed us to bring in another second round pick, which will strengthen our position in this year’s draft, and also a third rounder next year which is really good going forward.
“Jordan was obviously a free agent and was keen to leave and go to Collingwood.
“Given his fantastic service for us over a period of time, we were able to accommodate that with Collingwood.”
VISIT THE BULLDOGS’ NAB TRADE AND DRAFT HUB, POWERED BY MERCEDES-BENZ VANS
