With the former NRL player not returning for a second year as captain-coach, Matt Forsyth and Chris Maher have been named as co-coaches for 2019.

The two Bulldogs juniors are looking to build on the platform laid by Buttriss this season.

“I want to follow on from what Glen has brought this year with the club attitude and the culture,” Forsyth said.

“Bringing the juniors up is a big thing for me as I’ve coached them for so long.

“They are good enough to play first grade.”

Forsyth has been coaching Bulldogs juniors sides for the best part of a decade and is looking forward to stepping up next season.

But while Forsyth has plenty of coaching experience, it will be Maher’s first crack at it.

He returned to the Bulldogs this season after two years with Temora and is looking forward to the challenge.

“I haven’t coached before so it is all new to me, but I’ve been around the club a long time and know all the boys and how they play,” Maher said.

“I’ll just be trying to improve their game a little bit.”

After an impressive recruitment drive in 2018 Cootamundra went from wooden spooners to just missing out of a finals appearance.

They finished a point outside the top four and returning to finals for the first time since 2013 is firmly on the agenda for the new coaching pairing.

Any other year fifth would have been good enough but with the changes after Tumbarumba went into recess it wasn’t to be for the Bulldogs.

“It was so tight this year and it would have been good if they had kept the five, but it is what it is,” Maher said. 

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