EXCLUSIVE: Phil Gould concedes Bulldogs 'rethinking' everything as six again rule destroys winning formula

Bulldogs football boss Phil Gould has conceded the club is "rethinking every part of our operation" after a series of worrying losses put the spotlight on their roster and game plan.

Speaking on Wide World of Sports' Six Tackles with Gus podcast, Gould addressed growing concerns with the team's performances.

He said the NRL's tweak to the six again interpretation, which has rewarded teams that thrive on quick rucks and a retreating defensive line, had been detrimental to the way Canterbury had set out to win games.

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In 2025, Cameron Ciraldo moulded a team that would grind opponents into the dirt and was the hardest team in the competition to score against, conceding just 414 points for the regular season at an average of 17.25 points per game.

That Bulldogs team had faith that if it scored three tries it would likely win the game but its proud defensive system has been broken by the relentless pace of the game style in 2026.

"If I had one theory about the whole thing, and I'm not the football coach, I'm not telling the coach or anything, but we built this team over the last couple of years built on old DNA of defence and fitness and resilience," Gould said.

"And we haven't been a big pointscoring team for the last two years either, we've been winning games three tries to one and four tries to two and we've really backed our defence, and in the game today it's hard to do that. It just hasn't suited us.

"You look at the point scores on the weekend, I think it was 38-16, 32-10, 46-18, 34-8, 36-12, 42-12, 28-6, all the scoreboards look the same, one team seems to get a run on and runs away on the scoreboard and the other team can't seem to cope because of a lack of possession and what have you, now that's a trend that we've seen over the last month in particular in rugby league and we're on the wrong end of that.

"It's got us rethinking every part of our operation but right at the moment we need to support the players and we need to support the coaches and see if we can get some good performances and some confidence back into their football."

Gould said the recent lopsided scorelines against them - in the last four games they've been defeated 38-16, 44-12, 28-12 and 32-12 - had dented the players' confidence.

He said it was his job and the job of the coaching staff to keep the players focused on what they could control and try to insulate them from the pressure of the outside noise.

"You've just got to get out there and do it one play at a time and not worry about the end result or what the noise is outside and I do think the noise has got to a few of them, I do think that the pressure of losing and the pressure of being part of this big club has probably overwhelmed a few of them and we've got to turn that around for them."

Asked specifically by host Mat Thompson if Gould felt the Bulldogs had the right players to turn things around, he was adamant that they were "very good footballers".

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"It's not one thing, it's not one little thing, it's a whole combination and a factor of things," he said.

"They're very good footballers and right at the moment we just haven't come to terms with what the modern game's looking like and we get frustrated with when the points aren't accumulating and then all of a sudden the opposition scores and I think there's a drop in confidence and a drop in their heads and they've just got to be a bit more resilient than that and we've just got to get them back the love of playing and enjoying their football and as you say, when you're losing that's very hard to do.

"We've got to support them through that process and keep going."

Gould said in the long-term the Bulldogs could address their problems by nurturing the right talent through their academy but argued the current side under Ciraldo had already gone a long way to restoring the club's pride, which had been dented by a long spell towards the bottom of the ladder.

"The whole idea of this team was to give our club, over the last couple of years, a new perspective and give them some credibility. Bulldogs have been out of the firing line for about a decade... And I think they did that, I think they've done a wonderful job over the last two years and it sort of pains me to see them going through this at the moment but they're a good bunch, they're a resilient bunch and I'm sure they'll pull their way out of it."