Western Bulldogs fans could not have asked for a better start to the season.
After victory over reigning premier Brisbane at the Gabba and an 81-point thumping of rivals Greater Western Sydney at Marvel, the Dogs travelled to Adelaide Oval on Friday and withstood a ramping Adelaide in a thrilling final quarter to go 3-0 for the first time since 2021 and sit atop the ladder.
Bulldogs coach Luke Beveridge said his side had passed every test it had been thrown so far in 2026.
"I'm not a great forecaster, I'm not a great tipster, (but) before the season, if you asked me what I thought were the most challenging parts of the fixture for us, it would be Brisbane at the Gabba, the Crows here, it would be Fremantle at Optus and it would be the Gold Coast Suns at People First Stadium," he said.
"So to tick off two of them... it's pretty encouraging.
"Ultra proud of the boys to hold sway under pretty significant conditions and pressure in the last quarter. I mean the Crows kicked some extraordinary goals and we couldn't quite hold that back."
In arguably the match of the round, Beveridge's men took home the chocolates with a six-point victory. Speedy utility Oskar Baker was the hero with a magical snap from the pocket in the dying stages.
The long-serving Bulldogs coach said while Baker's goal will deservedly be the highlight of the game for fans, he said the efforts of his key defenders to thwart Adelaide's Riley Thilthorpe, Taylor Walker and Darcy Fogarty should not go unnoticed.
"I'm talking about (Buku Khamis), James O'Donnell and Rory Lobb," he said. "They diffused so many situations with their presence in the air.
"Our doctors are ultra conservative so they wanted to take James off just to make sure he was okay, which he was, got a bit winded out (on the interchange) side of the ground. There was a period of instability there with him off and their big threats; to cover that we had to ask Bailey Williams to go back and play back there for a period of time.
"He and the other big defenders were quite exceptional tonight."
Having led by three goals at the final change of ends, the Dogs were quickly over taken by a fast-finishing Crows outfit in front of their parochial home crowd, before the Bulldogs found their resolve in the final few minutes to reclaim the lead.
A task which was made harder with the game's clock malfunctioning late in the match said Beveridge.
"No one knew what the time was until it to about.. five or six minutes to go," he said.
"I think everyone was flustered, because you weren't sure how urgent it was based on with that clock ticking down. But I thought our players managed it pretty well.
"When you have a small margin you are definitely risk managing. You are just trying to make sure the opposition doesn't score.
"These days, because of the centre bounce six-six-six you can only get it by running patterns from the ball up."
