A DISAPPOINTED but proud Fremantle coach Trent Cooper admitted his side’s three-point loss on the road to the Western Bulldogs “was a big step in the right direction” despite heading home without any premiership points, After two heavy defeats at the hands of Brisbane and Geelong, the Dockers, who have the longest injury list in the AFL Women’s, lead for the majority of the Round 3 contest, and only just fell short, going down 3.5 (23) to 3.2 (20) at Ikon Park last night.

Post-game, Cooper said the key message to the players was that the effort was there, it just was not quite enough to come away with the win.

“That was the message then, that we were disappointed but proud of the efforts,” Cooper said. “We’ve obviously, we’ve got people out at the moment, that’s a given. “But we still haven’t performed anywhere near where we should the last two weeks against Brisbane and Geelong. “Tonight was a big step in the right direction.”

In the wake of the big defeats and asking for a response from his leaders, it was no surprise to see Kiara Bowers step up to have 17 disposals and eight clearances, alongside captain Hayley Miller (16 and four). The pair both had interrupted preseasons, but continued to grow, laying a combined 17 tackles and have the most metres gained of any Dockers players with 671 metres together.

Though those two stood up as expected, Cooper said the switch of Sarah Verrier to the wing was a positive move, which was made possible by the return of Jess Low to the back five.

“We’ve been struggling to get inside 50 and the penetration through there and that was what we decided today to do, get her up on a wing,” Cooper said of Verrier’s switch. “Sacrifice what’s a really good player down back but I always through she’ll end up as either a wing or an inside mid as she builds her tank and she’s been doing that. “Tonight was as good as time as any to try that and I think she showed a bit.

Low steadied the defence, but with the likes of Janelle Cuthbertson still to return for the Dockers, Cooper admitted he still needed experience bodies down in defence, so was unable to complete another planned role change in Emma O’Driscoll forward.

“We trained her a lot there this year, but where we’re at at the moment, we can’t do that so those options are limited, but Jess Low coming back into the side allowed Verrier to get to the wing and have some nice touches,” Cooper said.

The Dockers are still lacking height across the field, but Cooper praised the work of ruck Mim Strom for working hard defensively and trying to drop into the hole. Strom finished the game with seven intercepts and nine hitouts.

“We’re obviously a bit short down back at the moment without Cuthbertson down there,” Cooper said. “I thought Emma O’Driscoll was outstanding down back in the role that she did, so Mim always works back and helps out. “She wanted to make sure, she knew we were a bit short back there and did that really well.”

Up the other end, 185cm Aine Tighe provided a presence inside 50, switching from the defensive half of the ground to inside 50, and while she was unable to dominate aerially, provided a contest and kicked an important goal.

“I think she’s pretty disappointed at the moment that she didn’t have the impact she would have liked in the second half but she really looks dangerous there,” Cooper said. “She’s tall, she does get a lot of attention obviously. “The marks will come or the free kicks will come and I think she’ll kick a bag at some stage this year.”

The talking point in the loss was the amount of marks the Bulldogs pulled down in the second half, with Fremantle – usually a marking side itself – not having the height to compete with the Dogs. They had 156 less marks (33-49) but critically seven less contested marks (4-11), most of which came after half-time, and as the Dockers were fiercely attacking.

“We know we were shorter than they were and we just needed a couple of better efforts,” Cooper said. “We saw Sarah Verrier go back and put on a really good effort to bring a ball to ground and we probably needed a few more like that in those situations. “If we thought we could get the ball to ground, we could outrun them. Even in that last passage of play, there’s a minute 40 to go and they just controlled it with contested marks and we needed to change that a bit.”

Fremantle has a run of three games in Western Australia coming up, taking on Carlton, West Coast and then Melbourne as the Dockers hope to bring back some key players to kick-start their season after promising signs last night.