NRL 2021: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs Season Review

The 2021 NRL season isn’t one the Bulldogs will look upon fondly, but they have a handful of reasons to be optimistic heading into 2022.

Here’s your Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs Season Review for 2021:

• The Season In Brief: Stats and Summary
• Takeaways From 2021
  • Things I Liked: Bailey Biondi Odo, Round 25
  • 3-2-1: Jake Averillo, Luke Thompson, Aaron Schoupp
  • Summer Notepad: Kyle Flanagan
• Preseason Prediction Throwback
• Way Too Early Thoughts On 2022

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The Season In Brief

We’re summing up the NRL season in a few words before getting into the nitty-gritty and breaking down some of the key moments in 2021.

By The Numbers

They have the highest completion rate and least handling errors but this has not translated into winning football for the Bulldogs in 2021. Despite these numbers, the Bulldogs spent the least amount of time in possession this season – whatever they tried to do in attack did not work, and they were choked out of games all year as a result.

Copy: Bar Chart
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The Season In 200 Words

Dumpster fire. Disheartening. Dire. We’re getting to the positives soon, but when youngsters look over the record books in 20 years time and see a Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs team won three games in 2021, they’re going to have a pretty good idea of how the season played out. It wasn’t one of near-misses or games that got away. As impressive as the fight in this team could be at times, few sat back and gave them much of a chance at victory no matter how close they might be on the scoreboard at the time.

Trent Barrett hasn’t showered himself in glory this year. His handling of team selections and in-game rotations has left a lot to be desired. The lack of development out of Kyle Flanagan, in particular, is a concern moving forward. Still, the Doggies finished on a high note, moved along some of the deadwood and welcomed in a nice combination of proven attacking talent and players that are yet to play their best football.

It can’t get much worse than this in the coming years. This spoon should mark the end of a lengthy losing period and trigger the beginning of their rise towards the Top 8.

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Takeaways From 2021

Things I Liked

Jason picks out a few moments, matches or players that he liked most throughout the 2021 NRL season.

Bailey Biondi-Odo

The Bulldogs heaped a massive amount of cash into new recruits over the last two seasons. Their rise up the ladder hinges on how much they get out of the low-cost role players, though.

Bailey Biondi-Odo is one guy that can exceed his salary cap hit if he keeps trending the way he is right now.

His utility value is especially valuable in a side that is juggling players in key playmaking positions and his form at dummy half is exciting given the lack of quality the Bulldogs have at the position.

He has the vision to develop well as a hooker. This play, in particular, is very promising:

Biondi-Odo spots the peeling defender filling up on the wrong side. With Lachlan Lewis also spotting the opportunity, he sweeps around to the short side to create a four-on-three overlap. Biondi-Odo sends the marker scrambling to make up the numbers with a dummy and breaks the line before drawing the fullback for Aaron Schoupp to score. Very nice.

I like his attitude as well. Perhaps I’m reading too much into his reaction here but Biondi-Odo has just scored the second try of his NRL career and one that stops the Bulldogs from becoming the first team in the NRL era to go scoreless five times in one season here. He’s filthy about the situation and couldn’t care less about the notable moment in his individual career:

He’s only 19 years old and with just nine games of first-grade experience under his belt, but Biondi-Odo is an exciting young talent who will play a big part in how well the Bulldogs rebuild from 16th on the ladder.

Round 25: Bulldogs 38 def. Tigers 0

Is there anything more Bulldogs in recent years than finishing a season well to offer hope over the summer? Unfortunately, their ability to string wins together at the back end of one season hasn’t translated into competition points to start the next, but they’ve given themselves a platform to build on in 2022.

Blessed with playing a Tigers side that has rolled over at the slightest sign of struggle all season, the Bulldogs pounced and made the most of their opportunity.

Scoring 38 points is a big deal for the Bulldogs. But we’ve seen bad teams pile on points before. They’ve often come with a little bit of luck attached or through actions and shifts they’re unlikely to repeat again the following week. However, while the Bulldogs were blessed with a few Tigers errors and the odd bounce of the ball, they scored some genuinely good tries.

This is one of the Bulldogs’ best-looking tries of the season. It’s well-worked, fluid and an action that can be repeated in 2022:

Ball playing middles are key to an NRL attack at the moment. Josh Jackson isn’t the most skilled middle forward going around but he is willing to get his hands on the ball and throw a pass. That long pass allows Jake Averillo to sweep to the outside and use Will Hopoate to occupy the two-in defender. With Nick Meaney sweeping wider still, the Bulldogs have created an overlap on the edge.

Good teams have created points like that all year. Unfortunately for the Bulldogs, it has taken them 25 rounds to put it all together across 80 minutes.

I’m not going to get caught up in late-season Bulldogs form, but it was good to see the Bulldogs attack finally produce something positive.

~ JO

3-2-1

True rugby league fans will know there’s nothing more legitimate than the Dally M’s 3-2-1 voting system…With that in mind, Oscar picks out three elements from the 2021 season that deserve a mention.

3 – Jake Averillo developing

There are a few good judges in the rugby league forum who don’t see Jake Averillo in the halves alongside Matt Burton next year, but I’m sticking with him. He can certainly do a job in the centres but considering the recruits Canterbury have incoming I think Averillo is best suited to the five-eighth role in 2022. 

He’s been asked to do far too much at halfback this season, but as the games ticked up, Averillo’s ballplaying and decision making improved. 

Instead of throwing premeditated passes down the line for bread-and-butter backline shifts, Averillo slowly began reading and engaging the defence. He has the speed and strength to take these opportunities but learning when to run or pass has been Averillo’s journey in 2021, and it’ll be made all the easier with Burton calling most of the shots in 2022. Given the opportunity to pick his moments on the ball, I’m expecting an improved attacking output from Averillo next season.

2 – Seeing the best of Luke Thompson

I’m still not sure we have in fact seen the best of Luke Thompson, but we certainly got glimpses this season. Suspensions prevented the big Englishman from establishing himself as a premiere front rower in 2021 but when he did pull it all together Thompsons qualities were compelling. 

Round 19 is a perfect representation of Thompson’s season. In 62 minutes he ran for 204 metres (69 in post-contact) to score a try, break 10 tackles and make 32 himself along the way.

He also got himself suspended for three weeks…

At his best Thompson is a metre-eating forward with good footwork and an offload through the line. He’s also an enforcer in defence. Perhaps he was asked to do too much at times this season with Canterbury’s forward pack stocks thin, but there are no excuses at NRL level and Thompson needs to clean up his game in order to have the influence he can have – and needs to have – in this Bulldogs side. 

1 – Aaron Schoupp 

With a host of established outside backs arriving at the club over the offseason, the musical chairs approach to Canterbury’s backline appears to be over. You would expect Josh Addo-Carr and Nick Cotric (wings), Matt Dufty (fullback) and Brent Naden (centre) to get first crack in the back five, leaving just one position open for contention. 

Aaron Schoupp is my pick.