Western Bulldogs’ coach Luke Beveridge has revealed he turned to rock band Pearl Jam to help inspire his team in another season of pandemic tumult.

On a night Marcus Bontempelli added yet another accolade to his expanding list of honours, with the Bulldogs captain claiming his fourth Charles Sutton Medal, Beveridge said there was a song from the famous 1990s Seattle grunge bid which typified what the Dogs had to overcome on their way to making the grand final.

“I used some words at the start of the year to reflect on Man of the Hour by Pearl Jam. That was all about being a destructive force in this competition,” Beveridge said.

“At times as we’re looking through the rounds, we’re seeing great evidence of that, to be able to beat the better teams on the road, to be able to make it to a grand final under the circumstances we did.

“Now we’ve just got to bang out a few dents, re-collect ourselves and really make sure that we sustain our momentum and our run at it. For now, we rest, we come back as determined as ever, and we look forward to 2022.”

The Bulldogs led by 19 points in the third term of Saturday’s grand final before Melbourne went on a breathtaking run which culminated in a 74-point win at Perth’s Optus Stadium.

Beveridge, the 2016 premiership coach, is well known for establishing themes and seeking inspiration for his team and staff from outside the football bubble.

“We need to move on, blank over the rear vision mirror and focus on our future, which is really exciting,” Beveridge said.

“It’s been a really tumultuous two years, really. If you consider how we finished off 2020 and what happened this year with our group, our club, we strung a lot of wins together.