Bulldogs boss Phil Gould has dropped a bombshell on the futures of current playmakers Lachlan Galvin and Matt Burton amid the club’s horror form slump.
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Gould revealed on The Bye Round Podcast that Galvin is unlikely to be the club’s long-term halfback, while Burton may also switch positions if he stays at the club.
The pair have been the Bulldogs’ halves combination since shortly after Galvin joined the club mid-season in 2025, but they have failed to fire as a combination.
The Bulldogs’ attack has been awful in 2026 and they are currently 14th on the ladder amid seven losses from their last eight games.
Gould admitted publicly for the first time what everyone has been saying, that Galvin is not a long-term halfback.
“I don’t think he is a long-term halfback and I don’t think we have had any intention of him being a long-term halfback,” Gould said.
“But I’ll tell you now he is the best halfback we have got this week for this game. It’s as simple as that and he has been since he walked in the joint.”
Gould defended Galvin for not being the finished article as a playmaker given his age.
“I don’t know any 20-year-old’s that are a first grade halfback,” Gould said.
“Nathan Cleary wasn’t a game manager at 20 years of age and I had first hand knowledge of him.
“It takes them time to fall into that role and do the job, so he’s doing a big job in a struggling team and I think acquitting himself very, very well.”
Gould was full of praise for Galvin despite the club’s struggles this season.
“Lachlan Galvin, he’s a very special individual and he’s a very special talent,” Gould said.
“But he’s a 20-year-old kid playing in a very, very important position. And you’ve got to consider Lachlan Galvin’s grounding coming into this.
“Galvin, I don’t think I’ve ever seen this too often before, went from schoolboy football to NRL with the West Tigers. He didn’t play any SG Ball.
“He didn’t play any Jersey Flegg. He didn’t play any NSW Cup. He finished a schoolboy season and the next thing he was playing NRL in first grade with the Tigers.
“So he’s obviously talented. He’s never had to run a football team as himself as No.7.
“And longer term, he’s probably not a No.7, but he’s getting great experience at the moment. He’s learning the game really well. It’s wonderful for him.”
Gould also denied any link between Galvin’s arrival and the departures of Toby Sexton and Reed Mahoney from the club.
“When the Lachlan Galvin thing became available we looked at it as just a great opportunity for the future of the club,” Gould said.
“It wasn’t necessarily about last year and that six month period. It was more about the next three years.
“In fact the first three weeks he was here I said to the coaches play him in reserve grade. I said, you don’t have to pick him, it is not about this year. We have got him for three and a half years not six months. I said you pick the team the way you see fit.
“Galvin forced his way into the team with his training and a lot of it at the request of some of the players he was playing with for how impressive he was at training at that time.
“I don’t think the coach was left with any choice other than to pick that kid in the side.”
Gould was pressed on whether he could have delayed Galvin’s signing until 2026.
“That’s not how it works,” Gould said.
“Originally I said we were not interested because he was signed until 2026. This was a kid they offered five years and five million dollars, so he was a pretty hot commodity at the time.
“It all happened quickly and it was either take the punt and buy him then or miss out altogether.
“I know it sounds coincidental. I know you are trying to marry up what happened in the second half of the year, with the first half of the year, but it had very little to do with that.
“These sorts of things with Mahoney and Sexton were in the pipeline for some months before Galvin became available.
“The Galvin thing had nothing to do with instigating the Mahoney and the Sexton decisions I can tell you that emphatically.”
Gould pointed out that Mahoney was released because the club could not afford him.
“We released Mahoney because we couldn’t afford him for 2027,” Gould said.
“If we kept him it would have been really difficult for us to retain other players that we have got in our club at that time.
“That was virtually a salary cap discussion between me and his manager early last year about what the future would look like.”
Gould put the decision to drop Mahoney late last season on the coaches and Cameron Ciraldo. Mahoney was fuming as the scenario unfolded, including an infamous moment in the dressing room when he gave a sarcastic smile to the internal TV camera.
“At that time he was being put back to the bench and his minutes were being reduced, but that is a coaching decision,” Gould said.
“But I can see what the coaches were saying and again the coaches want to win and are trying to get the best result for the team.”
Gould also discussed the future of five-eighth Matt Burton, again conceding his future may not lay in the halves.
The Dogs boss insisted he wanted to keep Burton at the club, but he may switch to the centres.
“I have had this conversation with Matt Burton and his management six or eight weeks ago and he is coming off-contract at the end of 2027,” Gould explained.
“All these rumblings in the media that he should be playing centre and he is off to Perth and the Bulldogs don’t want him.
“I sat down with him and his manager about all this rubbish in the papers and said, we would like to re-sign you and we would like you to stay with the Bulldogs.
“He said I want to stay with the Bulldogs and I said good, that’s a really good place to start.
“So in the next 18 months we have got to work out what we are going to pay Matt Burton and where he is going to play.”
Gould denied he is worried Burton could leave if he waits to ink an extension until after November 1.
“I’m not worried about November 1 and I told his manager that,” Gould said.
“I trust his manager and I trust Matt Burton. I’ve known him since he was a teenager.
“Burton is not going to run out in the middle of the night and sign somewhere else without telling me.
“Burton can get a contract anywhere tomorrow. The Bulldogs have the ability to not let that happen and that’s my intention.
“But Burton has got to tell me where he wants to play and if in that position he is contributing to the success of the team.”
Finally Gould was pressed if Burton’s future is at centre.
“Well you work it out, if he plays centre what are you going to pay him?” Gould said.
“And if you play him at five-eighth what could he earn? So he has got some decisions to make.
“We are very honest about the conversations. We are mates. Burton would have no problem walking out the door and getting a deal anywhere tomorrow to play five-eighth.”
However, Gould denied there was no future at No.6 for Burton at the club.
“I don’t know about that,” Gould said.
“We don’t know where Galvin is going to play longer-term.”
Originally published as ‘Not a No.7’: Phil Gould’s shock reveal on Bulldogs halves’ futures and star’s ugly exit
