Last week there was a lot of hype about Scott West’s return to football. I guess that’s what happens when you’re a 324-game, seven times best and fairest at your club. Westy made his return to football via the VFL competition at Williamstown which must have been strange for him because the last time he played at that level was in 1993. Back then I was only three years old and the competition wasn’t even called the VFL!

Given his presence at Burbank Oval last Saturday it might have been easy for some of the younger players like myself to shift our focus and watch how he goes about his business but Williamstown Coach and our Development Manager at the Bulldogs, Brad Gotch, made sure we were focused on the job at hand.

Westy is a great leader though and there is no doubt that having him in the team gave everyone an extra boost on Saturday. His presence and the game plan we had as a team certainly worked because we won by 155-points against Bendigo who only kicked one goal for the game.

The messages we are being given as players and the consistency of them, I think, has been the most important thing in the alignment between the Bulldogs and Williamstown this year. Especially for players like Josh Hill, Jarrod Harbrow and Callan Ward who have spent time at both the Bulldogs and Williamstown this season. I know it has made things easier for me when I play each weekend for the Seagulls.

It doesn’t matter whether we are training at Whitten or Burbank Oval, we are being given the same message from either Rodney Eade, one of his assistants or Brad Gotch. The best example I can think of is being better than the opposition at winning the contested football. It’s been a focus at training with the Bulldogs and it’s also something we work hard to achieve at Williamstown in the VFL. When we do that well at VFL level we win.

I think the consistency of message has given the players confidence to go out and perform at their best. That in turn has helped create a winning culture which will see the Bulldogs and Williamstown’s senior and reserves teams finish in the top three heading into the finals.

There are two games left before the VFL finals start and three teams, us, North Ballarat and Port Melbourne are even on points. We have the best percentage so are currently top of the table. If we can have two good performances against Box Hill and Werribee hopefully it will set us up for a good finals campaign. What a great experience that will be in my first year of senior football.