WAFL RD 1 PREVIEW

RD 1 WAFL PREVIEW | v SWAN DISTRICTS

The WAFL premiership defence of South Fremantle gets underway on Good Friday with a battle for the John Todd Memorial Cup against Swan Districts.

The premiership defence of South Fremantle gets underway on Good Friday and it looms as a fascinating first up match up on the road to the Swans.

The Bulldogs take on Swan Districts at Steel Blue Oval on what is a massive Good Friday of action that begins with the reserves match up at the Bassendean venue at 9:45am.

The WAFLW match up between the Bulldogs and Swans then also follows at 12:25pm before the WAFL league clash begins at 2:30pm, and then the colts battle will wrap up proceedings getting underway at 5:15pm.

South Fremantle come into the 2026 season after a dominant year in 2025 losing just one game along the way before completing the job in what was a dramatic finish to the grand final against East Perth at Optus Stadium.

That means the Bulldogs come into the 2026 season on a 15-game winning streak and looking to make a fast start to the premiership defence against a Swan Districts team that are trying to make amends for a difficult 2025 in their own right.

South Fremantle come into the season attempting to win back-to-back premierships for the first time since consecutive flag triumphs in 1952-53-54.

Since then, the Bulldogs have never been able to back up a premiership ending up missing finals in 1971, 1998 and 2010, and making finals but not quite being able to go all the way in 1981, 2006 and 2021.

While South Fremantle coach Craig White is focused on the task at hand and doing the right things to give the Bulldogs a chance to change that history, he is aware of it and hopes that he can buck the trend like he was unable to do as a player in the 2005 and 2009 flags he was part of.

“I’m not sure if it’s a mindset thing, if the boys take the foot off the pedal a little bit, if it’s natural turnover from within the squad and there’s probably a lot of reasons why it’s really hard to be able to back up,” White told 91.3 SportFM.

“But all we can really try to concentrate on is trying to make sure that we are a fit squad and that we can try to minimise injury throughout the year to keep your best payers on the park, and try to develop and learn as you go as well.

“We obviously were really successful last year but we were able to learn a couple of things along the way, and even a couple of things this pre-season that we did different to what we did last year, and I’m still relatively young in a coaching sense.

“So to try and keep on evolving and learning to try and improve the squad, and the club as a whole, is really important.”

From that South Fremantle premiership team of last year, Haiden Schloithe, Tom Blechynden, Zac Strom, Brandon Donaldson, Matt Ward, Jaxon Artemis and Matthew Parker won’t be out there on Good Friday.

New faces into the South Fremantle team for the first game of the season are Mitchell Geier, Jordan Boullineau, Aidan Harvey, Ed Graham, Ashton Ferreira, Tarkyn Etherington, Sam Otto and Lucas Robinson.

South Fremantle come into the Good Friday match up having beaten Swan Districts in both meetings of 2025 but only by a combined 24 points while the Round 1 clash will also see the John Todd Memorial Cup on the line.

Speaking of Todd, Bulldogs premiership captain Chad Pearson is especially glad to be part of games that continue to honour his remarkable legacy at not only South Fremantle but in WA football all over.

“Early in my career, we were fortunate enough to have John came in and speak to the group after a game, and that’s something that’s always stuck with me,” Pearson said.

“Just being able to hear from someone you’ve grown up hearing about was pretty special. Even in a short chat, you could see how much he cared about the club and how passionate he was about its success. It gave me a pretty good understanding of why he’s so highly regarded.”

Pearson is now especially looking forward to this season’s opener which happens to fall on Good Friday and doubles as the John Todd Memorial Cup match up.

“It’s a real privilege to be part of a game like this. To play in something that recognises what John gave to both clubs is pretty special,” Pearson said.

“Having it in Round 1 makes it even better — it’s a great way to start the year, and there’s a lot of excitement in the group to be involved in a game that means so much to the club.”