It may be a tad dramatic to describe Andrew George as the captain standing amid the ruins of the Bulldogs’ premiership-winning side, but it is apt.
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George, for one, doesn’t have a problem with the metaphor.
“You could put it that way,” he said.
Seven months after tasting the sweetest of premiership triumphs following years of hardship, Gunnedah will confront the New England Nomads in the grand final replay a shadow of their former selves, like a stripped car.
Ahead of that clash at Wolseley Park on Saturday, George said some 10 players from the premiership squad had departed for various reasons.
“Take your pick. It’s everything,” the skipper said, adding that the biggest losses were Scott Hardy, Brad Jenkinson and last season's player-coach, Greg Piggott.
He said: “Obviously we knew we were gonna lose a few guys, you do every year.
“We lost a few at the start [of pre-season]. And then the last few weeks I’ve had guys contact me and say they’re not playing for different reasons.”
So dire was the situation, the club was “struggling for numbers” ahead of the Nomads clash, George said, with mainstays Matt Pengilly, Mark Barrow and Oliver Neader unavailable this week.
“We’ve got four or five out with different things, so we’re a bit on the back foot,” he said.
“But we’ve got a few new younger guys that are gonna play for us, filling in from other codes. So we’ll have enough for a side, but we’ll see how we’ll go.”
George described Piggott’s departure as a “massive” loss.
With no prior coaching experience, George has reluctantly accepted that the job is now his.
“I don’t necessarily want to [coach] at the moment,” he said. “I’d rather just be able to turn up and play. [That] would be nice. But if I don’t do it, I guess no one else is going to.”
