{"id":12108,"date":"2025-07-22T00:40:12","date_gmt":"2025-07-22T00:40:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/12108\/"},"modified":"2025-07-22T00:40:12","modified_gmt":"2025-07-22T00:40:12","slug":"afl-superstar-marcus-bontempelli-finally-signs-new-deal-with-western-bulldogs-after-anxious-wait","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/12108\/","title":{"rendered":"AFL superstar Marcus Bontempelli finally signs new deal with Western Bulldogs after anxious wait"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"css-1n6q21n-StyledParagraph e4e0a020\">Marcus Bontempelli has finally put pen to paper on a new four-year deal with the <a class=\"css-1lg16vp-StyledTextLink ezegcyi0\" data-link-type=\"article-inline\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/7news.com.au\/sport\/western-bulldogs\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Western Bulldogs<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-1n6q21n-StyledParagraph e4e0a020\">The captain\u2019s existing contract expires at the end of the season and intrigue surrounded negotiations for what is almost certain to be the last long-term agreement of his stellar <a class=\"css-1lg16vp-StyledTextLink ezegcyi0\" data-link-type=\"article-inline\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/7news.com.au\/sport\/afl\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">AFL<\/a> career.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-1n6q21n-StyledParagraph e4e0a020\">Player and club were both adamant negotiations would ramp up during the year but fans have grown increasingly anxious in recent weeks.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-178igh4-StyledParagraph e1s06mna1\">Know the news with the 7NEWS app: <a class=\"css-cvgehw-StyledContextualLink e1s06mna0\" href=\"https:\/\/7news.com.au\/app?utm_source=7NEWS&amp;utm_medium=contextual-link-app&amp;utm_campaign=7news-app\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Download today <img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/7news.com.au\/static\/media\/right-red-arrow.92bca5db.svg\" alt=\"Download today\" height=\"14\" width=\"20\"\/><\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"css-1n6q21n-StyledParagraph e4e0a020\">The new contract will run through to the end of the 2029 season, when Bontempelli could be within touching distance of Brad Johnson\u2019s club-record 364 games.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-1n6q21n-StyledParagraph e4e0a020\">Bontempelli turns 30 in November and recently notched up his 250th game.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-1n6q21n-StyledParagraph e4e0a020\">He was honoured as the Bulldogs\u2019 second greatest player at a centenary gala on Monday night, behind only Ted Whitten.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-1n6q21n-StyledParagraph e4e0a020\">A 2016 premiership player, Bontempelli has won six best and fairest awards \u2014 including three since taking over as skipper in 2020.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-1n6q21n-StyledParagraph e4e0a020\">The No.4 was also named captain of the All Australian team last year.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-1n6q21n-StyledParagraph e4e0a020\">More to come&#8230;<\/p>\n<p><a class=\"css-6fiqrm-StyledLinkWrapper e1y7kr221\" href=\"https:\/\/7news.com.au\/sport\/afl\/new-footy-boss-greg-swann-issues-interesting-demand-for-own-office-on-day-one-at-afl-house-c-19432983\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><\/p>\n<p>New AFL boss issues \u2018interesting\u2019 demand on day one<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-xp0jgm-StyledTimeToRead e1y7kr223\">2 min read<\/p>\n<p><\/a><a class=\"css-6fiqrm-StyledLinkWrapper e1y7kr221\" href=\"https:\/\/7news.com.au\/sport\/afl\/unfair-new-reality-facing-harley-reid-amid-monster-contract-talks-c-19432301\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><\/p>\n<p>\u2018Unfair\u2019 new reality facing Harley Reid: \u2018Very, very boring\u2019<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-xp0jgm-StyledTimeToRead e1y7kr223\">3 min read<\/p>\n<p><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Marcus Bontempelli has finally put pen to paper on a new four-year deal with the Western Bulldogs. The&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":12109,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[560],"tags":[638,64,63,55,639,588,85,698],"class_list":["post-12108","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-afl","tag-afl","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-australian-football-league","tag-australianfootballleague","tag-sport","tag-sports","tag-western-bulldogs"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12108","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12108"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12108\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12109"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12108"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12108"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12108"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}