Western Bulldogs coach Luke Beveridge is buoyed by his club's Thursday night performance despite going down to Sydney by 14 points at Marvel Stadium as a host of key stars went down.
In a tight contest, Beveridge chalked up the loss to "monumental" missed chances throughout the evening, while the loss of Ed Richards (concussion), Anthony Scott (concussion) and key forward Aaron Naught (knee) made things a lot harder.
However, in the post-game press conference, the 2016 premiership coach was full of praise for his injury-ravaged side, who got within eight points late in the last quarter before the Swans held on for their 10th victory of the season.
"In the long run, I just thought our players showed enormous character," Beveridge said.
"All in all, it showed there was great integrity in what the boys did and obviously against the top side, so it's just a shame, we had a bit of bad luck. You never lose and feel like a winner, but in my books, our players are winners tonight, I thought they were outstanding."
The Bulldogs took it to the competition's benchmark, leading disposal (367-328), inside 50s (60-46), clearances (38-33), contested possessions (138-105), turnovers (56-67), tackles inside 50 (14-3) and shots on goal (28-22) counts but inaccuracy in front of goal was the determining factor.
"I think system and game style look pretty good, we just made some monumental blues and missed monumental chances to give ourselves any real chance to win the game," Beveridge said.
Despite swallowing the bitter pill that is losing, the Bulldogs shared their concern for the injured trifecta, who will miss at least the Round 12 clash with Collingwood on Friday.
Scott and Richards will enter the AFL's concussion protocols while Naughton's inopportune knee injury is hopefully not as "extreme as" an anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) tear.
"We're extremely conservative (when it comes to concussion), we'll always have our players' health and wellbeing at the forefront regardless of whether or not it even costs you momentum or even the possibility of a victory here and there, you've just got to take care of the players," Beveridge said.
"We're pretty optimistic it's not his ACL."
Western Bulldogs GM of Football Operations Matthew Egan provides an update on Aaron Naughton.#AFLDogsSwans pic.twitter.com/zAbP3IoHsb
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"So yeah, they'll go into concussion protocols, will obviously miss next week's game, and beyond that, you know, hopefully they're OK and can play the next week but we'll wait and see.
"The indications are that it's hopefully not as extreme as an ACL, but you never can tell. So, we'll give you the information after they've looked at it a bit closely, and they get the results back from the clinics. Fingers crossed that it's not too extreme," Beveridge said.
Out-of-favour forward Rory Lobb is likely to regain his spot in the side while defender James O'Donnell was a late withdrawal with illness and is expected to be available for Friday.
