Jamarra Ugle Hagan won’t replace Sam Darcy, Marcus Bontempelli hailed for brilliant return

The looming loss of Sam Darcy wasn’t offset by the spectacular return of Western Bulldogs captain Marcus Bontempelli but the skipper’s outstanding season debut, and a big victory, was some comfort for coach Luke Beveridge.

Darcy, who suffered a suspected ACL injury in the comprehensive 71-point victory over St Kilda at Marvel Stadium, won’t be replaced by troubled former No.1 pick Jamarra Ugle Hagan who Beveridge said was “not worth discussing” given his current standing at the club.

“That is not going to happen in the immediate term so it is probably not worth discussing at the moment. As far as any replacements go, we really can’t consider Marra,” Beveridge said.

But Bontempelli’s “outstanding” season-debut and three goals from Aaron Naughton, after losing Darcy in the first-half, was proof positive all is not lost at the Dogs despite Darcy’s horror injury.

Beveridge said Bontempelli had a been a “pro” in coming back from a complex calf injury and wasn’t surprised by the start turn from the

six-time all-Australian who finished with 30 disposals and eight clearances to be the best player on the ground.

“I don’t think anyone is (surprised) by what Marcus can do,” Beveridge said post-match.

“He was quite outstanding. I mean, when you’re that good a ball handler and understand the game as well as him and you’ve got that much courage and presence, hopefully he’s a handful week to week.

“But he’s just been a pro in his rehab.”

Beveridge said the emphatic result was made even more pleasing given the Bulldogs not only trailed by 17 points early in the contest, but also lost Sam Darcy to a suspected ACL injury in the first quarter.

“Each week you have to step up and you can’t have the opposition remind you of how much you need to step up, and we had a little bit of that at the start of the game with the Saints,” Beveridge said.

“So for, I think, to a man, whether they were our experienced players or some of the new bloods who haven’t played a lot of footy, just their composure and their time with the footy and their lateral movement, their agility, their game sense and the skill components - it was as well as we’ve distributed and used the ball for a while and that was really encouraging, so it would be nice to take that forward.

“We’d like to frank our momentum a bit and have a really good outing next week (against GWS).”

Beveridge praised his players in particular for sticking to the game plan and not letting the emotion of Darcy’s injury get the better of them.

“I didn’t think for a minute that the players deviated from what their challenge was or were affected in a detrimental way because of what may have happened to Sam. So they held it together,” Beveridge said.

“It was important that we stuck to task. We weren’t happy with the way we started and there were some things that we discussed that were imperatives that we had to get right and early it looked off so we did have a chat about that and the players really responded.”