The Canterbury Bankstown Bulldogs have won the first four games of the season for the first time since 1993. Coach Cameron Ciraldo, in his third year at the club, has assembled a squad of players who are working for each other, believing in his systems and playing with an enthusiasm which is very hard to stop. But do they have what it takes to win their first Premiership since 2004?
The Bulldogs started their 2025 season with a gritty 28-20 victory over the Dragons, followed by a convincing 40-24 thumping of the Titans, before an ugly 16-8 win over the Eels. You can't do any better than beating the sides put in front of you, but it was hardly a testing run for the Bulldogs.
If you watched the victory over the Eels, it was a dour, unimaginative performance that barely saw them scrape home. Many experts were ready to write the Bulldogs off based on that performance. With Matt Burton and Viliame Kikau missing, it seemed that the Canterbury just didn't have the weapons to challenge the top teams ahead. And so, for Round 4, they headed to Shark Park as the underdogs, with most expecting Cronulla to have too much firepower.
What we saw instead against the Sharks was the Bulldogs do something that I have not seen since Ciraldo took over -- they changed their plan of attack to suit the opposition. More bluntly, they HAD a plan of attack! For years now the Bulldogs have wandered about like lost sheep whenever inside the opposition's half. The best they could produce were basic block plays and backline sweeps that were as easy to read as "Spot the Dog".
Against the Sharks, with Jacob Preston playing on the side of the field usually occupied by the less nimble Kikau, the Bulldogs ran several plays where he was the key component. The first try of the game saw Preston receive the ball so late on a decoy run, that he had to reach out behind himself to reel it in. I'm sure the play wasn't designed for him to have to nearly dislocate his shoulder to juggle the pass, but it was a clever variation on anything we have seen before.
The Bulldogs' second try was similar, with Preston halfway through the defensive line and written off as a decoy, before receiving the ball a touch behind him. This time he drew the fullback and passed it onto Bronson Xerri. Their play on the left looked dangerous all night with another try to Xerri and two others denied, one by an intercept and the other by a controversial bunker call.
After the game Ciraldo said that he adapted the game plan, as he knew the Sharks would present their biggest challenge of the season so far.
"With our attack, we changed some roles and plays and shapes, just stuff we thought we needed to do to win this game," Ciraldo said.
"What we'd done in the first three weeks was really good, but it wasn't going to be enough to beat a quality Sharks team.
"As you do as your season goes on you have to build your game and we had done really well for three weeks of just winning the possession and field position battle, but tonight was going to take a little more and we had to make sure we got a few more plays on and I'm glad we did that.
"We knew it was going to be a semifinal type game tonight even though it's early in the year. They're a quality opposition and we had to play at a really high level and come up with some big plays if we were going to get the points."
What remains to be seen is how much more magic Ciraldo has up his sleeve. With Burton and Kikau to return from knee injuries, it will be interesting to see how they fit into a more creative game plan. They face the Knights this weekend, a team that might be best handled by a more simplified approach. After that they enjoy the bye, before facing the much-improved Rabbitohs and the always dangerous Broncos, which will be their biggest test of 2025 yet.
Interestingly, they don't face the premiership favourite Melbourne Storm until Round 25, which will be their only meeting before the finals. It will mark the beginning of a three-week run to the finals which will reveal whether the Bulldogs can really be taken seriously. After the Storm, their last two games of the season proper will be against the Panthers and the Sharks.
There remains some questions over the size of their middle forwards against the bigger packs and winning the ruck is crucial when taking on the Storm. There are also issues around the base of the scrum where no one can quite understand Ciraldo's insistence on using Jaeman Salmon in an Isaah Yeo ball-playing lock role, when he has Kurt Mann sitting on the bench. Halfback Toby Sexton is improving on a weekly basis and their outside backs, it seems, are the equal of any in the league.
If they manage to avoid key injuries, maintain a Top 4 position through till the end, and do well in those three key games, then everyone will have to take the Bulldogs' premiership chances seriously. All of that is a long way away. Time will tell, but the club and its fans can not have hoped for anything more than what the Bulldogs have done so far in 2025. Ciraldo has them playing for each other, believing in his plans, and out-enthusing every team they have faced thus far.
Good times for the Bulldogs' long-suffering fans. Good times, so far.