AFL: Western Bulldogs list manager Sam Power outlines how they plan to retain out-of-contract stars

Western Bulldogs list boss Sam Power is confident the club’s salary cap is ideally positioned to retain all their high-profile free agents and out-of-contract stars this year.

Bailey Dale, Caleb Daniel, Josh Dunkley, Tim English, Alex Keath, Jack Macrae, Bailey Smith and Jason Johannisen headline the 22 Bulldogs without a contract beyond the 2022 season.

New vice-captain and star free agent Macrae said this week he wanted to “retire as a Western Bulldogs player” in a positive sign for Power’s onerous task to re-sign the triple All-Australian.

English (Western Australia) and Daniel (South Australia) grew up interstate and Dunkley wanted to be traded to Essendon two years ago, so it may not be a straightforward exercise.

Dale transformed from a fringe forward to an All-Australian halfback last year, Norm Smith medallist Johannisen was recast as a forward and ex-Crow Keath is the Dogs’ No.1 key defender.

Emerging midfielder Smith, 21, might be the top priority of the bunch, given the excellent start to his career and immense off-field popularity he has generated.

Port Adelaide vs Western Bulldogs
Triple All-Australian Jack Macrae is a free agent this year but says he wants to be a Bulldog for life. Michael Klein Credit: News Corp Australia

That collection of star power coming out of contract at the same time has cost clubs previously, but Power told Western Bulldogs members in a Q&A video that their list strategy was geared towards this scenario.

“When we think the group of players is going to be in a certain window where they’re challenging for a premiership, you’re really aligning your TPP (total player payments) closely to that,” Power said.

“We feel that the playing group is in that window, so we’ve had a really clear strategy and we’ve aligned our TPP to that over a period of time now.

“That gives us really good confidence that we’ll be able to retain our key players.

“We have clearly got a lot of players out of contract this year, but there are discussions ongoing with a lot of those players at the moment.

“We’re really confident at this stage that we’ll be able to retain those players and keep this group together.

2021 AFL Grand Final
Caleb Daniel is among a bunch of star Bulldogs whose contracts expire at season’s end. Michael Klein Credit: News Corp Australia

“We feel they’re in a really good place in terms of their development and hopefully what they can achieve over the next period of time.”

Power dodged a question around which of the out-of-contract crew was his highest-priority signing, saying he deemed that top-tier crop as “pretty critical” in totality.

“There are some good players coming out of contract, but it’s not uncommon across the competition for a lot of players to be coming out in any given year and we’re no different to that,” he said.

“I think from a club perspective, it allows clubs to maintain flexibility. It also helps from a salary cap management point of view.

“In terms of ouxjmtzywr guys, there are clearly six or seven priorities and we want to retain every single one.”

 

THE BULLDOGS' OUT-OF-CONTRACT CREW