Western Bulldogs captain Marcus Bontempelli says he and the group are constantly in awe of clearance king Tom Liberatore.

Liberatore’s dominance was again on full display during Sunday’s come-from-behind win over Carlton, registering a game-high 13 clearances to take his season total to 72 from eight games.

He has 14 more clearances than any other player in the competition.

Bontempelli said while he and the team know what the 28-year-old is capable of doing on-field, it’s still incredible to watch.

“I still don’t know (how he does it) – that’s probably been the thing after playing with him for seven, almost eight years,” Bontempelli said of Liberatore, on RSN Breakfast Club.

“We still marvel – when you see him find a way to find teammates and his awareness, it’s like he’s looked at something, almost taken a picture of it in his head, and then be able to turn around, hunt the footy and know if (the field) has changed or not.

“It happens too often, for him to be able to extract (the ball) and then find a teammate without almost looking at times.

“Ultimately we just know what Tom is really good at, and he probably knows too and knows where his strengths lie, so we allow him and he allows himself to just go to work on that. We all benefit on the outside.

“He’s an incredible player and I guess one of my favourite teammates over the journey because he brings so much more than just his hands and grunt inside.

Bontempelli also played a starring role in the Bulldogs’ comeback, leading from the front in another captain’s performance.

He said while his efforts throughout the game remained the same, he wanted to put more of an emphasis on the quality of those efforts.  

“The captaincy thing probably doesn’t become a driver, it’s more that I need to play well for the team here,” Bontempelli said.

“You know when you’re not playing well, or you haven’t from a quality perspective got enough out of your disposals or efforts, so we all needed a bit of a spike across the ball (against Carlton).

“We had a couple of players who were still influencing the game the way we wanted to, but clearly not enough, and as a player you want to be able to do that – you want to be able to go ‘Righto, how can I change things?’, and quickly be able to reset and start influencing.

“My mindset is just my next effort or my next chance – that’s where I’m going to give 100% on it. Then I keep bridging from effort and moment to moment.

“You start to break the game down into smaller moments and then find that hopefully you build some momentum and consistency in your game.”

The Bulldogs face another big challenge this Saturday night, against third-placed Port Adelaide at Adelaide Oval.