After a busy off-season, in which the club recruited heavily and bolstered its ranks, the knockout was a stellar performance for the team, and proved that the club is on the right track. 

"Going into this season, we targeted trophies and targeted wins," Bulldogs coach Adam Kyle said. 

"This was just the first one this season. Good performance from the boys, but it's just a start hopefully for bigger and better things." 

One of the most improved aspects of the Bulldogs' play was their defence, which saw them only concede a handful of tries in four matches. 

"We've got plenty of attacking players," Kyle said, "but it was how we defend this year [that is the focus] … and over four games to only concede three or four tries is really exceptional." 

After an injury-plagued 2018 season, which saw players from Reserve Grade and Under 18s routinely called into the First Grade side, one of the most pleasing aspects of the weekend for Kyle was that there were no major injuries. 

"The biggest thing for us was just trying to manage game time for our players," Kyle said. 

"Incredibly, four games in 24 hours, we've actually come out of it injury-free. For us, it couldn't have gone too much better. We anticipated the we may have a few bumps and bruises, but as of last night on the way home the boys seemed pretty good, apart from a couple of corks here and there." 

The weekend also gave Kyle an opportunity to test the depth of the squad, which passed with flying colours, particularly considering that five First Grade players were unavailable for the tournament. 

"While we took a very strong squad, it's definitely a squad that can still get stronger as we go," Kyle said. 

"We were really conscious about making sure that we had depth in our club." 

The tournament was played across Friday and Saturday night, and featured teams from all across southern NSW. 

The next tournament in which the Bulldogs will play is the West Belconnen 9s on March 8 and 9.