The Western Bulldogs will host Brisbane in what looks like a pretty straightforward game of footy at Etihad Stadium.
These two sides could not be much further apart in terms of where they’re at – the Bulldogs are the reigning premiers, Brisbane are perennial cellar dwellers.
That said, the Dogs haven’t been in such awesome form to start the year – they’ve been lucky to get wins against Collingwood and last week North Melbourne, and dropped a game to Fremantle.
Are they experiencing a premiership hangover? Maybe, or perhaps their elite finals campaign last year was just a lucky outlier.
Brisbane on the other hand don’t have a lot to show for the season so far – they beat Gold Coast by a slim margin in Round 1, and have lost every game since.
To be fair they’ve been relatively competitive against Essendon and St Kilda, but they were blown away by Richmond last week.
It’s painfully obvious that this is still a young team and while they will surprise a few opponents this year they are still likely a bottom-four side.
The Dogs only have one change for this match and it’s a forced change, with Travis Cloke to miss due to broken ribs – Shane Biggs is in as his replacement.
Brisbane have brought in Ryan Harwood, Ryan Bastinac and Liam Dawson to replace Tom Cutler (hamstring), and Rohan Bewick and Tom Bell, who have been dropped.
All things considered this game looks like a clear win to the Bulldogs and they’re in at incredibly short odds of $1.08.
Two of the last three matches between these sides have seen big Bulldogs wins and $1.5 on a 40+ points win looks good.
With Cloke gone expect Tom Boyd to attract more forward entries, a big day could be on the cards. $2.50 for him to kick three goals could be a smart bet.