DOGS BELIEF HIGH
BULLDOGS coach Dean Pay believes the club is building something special as they look to keep their fairy tale NRL finals charge alive against the Cowboys in Townsville.
The 12th-placed Bulldogs are riding a four-game winning streak as they look to spoil the party for North Queensland’s final game at their original home ground at 1300SMILES Stadium.
Canterbury grinded out a tough 12-6 win over arch rivals the Parramatta Eels last weekend and Pay said it was his side’s defensive effort that had sparked their late-season surge.
“When we came back from the break (after Origin), we sat down as a team and we spoke about we wanted to finish the season off the best way we possibly can,” he said.
“We spoke about putting a lot of energy into our defence and over the last six or seven weeks that’s what’s kept us in games and given us the opportunity to win games.
“It’s a real credit to the boys.
“We’ve been working really hard on our defence and our scramble, but you can only sort of put so much intent to try and build that.
“It’s the spirit that the boys are playing with and they keep turning up for one another — they’re building something here and we’re building something here as a club.”
The Bulldogs still need to win their last two games against the Cowboys and Broncos while also hoping six other results fall their way to scrape into the top eight.
Pay expected the Cowboys to be fired up in their last home game of the season, but he said the Bulldogs had the belief that they were more than just a mathematical chance to play finals.
“That’s what we’re building. They care about one another and they’re building a lot of team spirit,” he said.
“We’ve never lost sight of what we’re trying to build. We want to be a top four team and we want to get there however long that takes it takes.
“We didn’t have a bad player (against the Eels) and over the last five or six weeks we’ve got a bit of joy out of what we’re doing at training and it’s coming out in our footy.
“I’m sure they (the Cowboys) want to finish their season off in the best possible fashion as well. We’ve got a few busted (players) so we’ll just get ourselves ready and go again.”