Mission possible: Blues can make finals, as new realism takes root

The final 10 was invented for the precise situation that the Carlton Football Club occupy, ensuring that fans of such a club are energised throughout the winter months.

To make the eight from 14th with 12 games left is like abseiling the Matterhorn – there’s little margin for a slip. You’d probably need to win 10 out of 12 to be confident of making it.

But 10th is not such a stretch – harder than walking up Mount Dandenong, sure, but achievable if they hold the improved form and emancipated mindset evident since Michael Voss’ dignified exit.

Carlton’s next four games are against bottom eight sides – Essendon, GWS, West Coast (in Melbourne) and Richmond. On form, they should win at least three; if they overcome the Giants and the bottom three, Josh Fraser will be getting free lattes in Lygon Street, even if he sticks to his stance that he won’t be a candidate for the coaching vacancy.

Giddy Carlton folk will recall they were similarly placed at this point of 2023, when Voss was first in the firing line; they were 14th with four wins, seven losses and a draw. This worsened to 4-8 and a draw after 13 games. As we know, they stormed home to win nine of 10, and made the preliminary final.

Carlton’s mysterious talent for upsetting Geelong made Friday night’s victory merely surprising, rather than startling. Patrick Cripps was magnificent at the end, literally rising to the moment with an uncharacteristic pack mark that delivered his team the winning goal – converted despite the risque choice of a Stevie J hook kick from straight in front.

Cripps’ revival has coincided with Carlton’s – the skipper’s turnaround beginning just before Voss joined the vast cohort of ex-Carlton coaches since 2000. This column is among those who had misunderestimated (a George W. Bush word) the dual-Brownlow medallist, who had struggled until the second half of round nine, Voss’ final game.

Carlton fans have a tendency to swing between excesses of excitement and despondency or anger. The clubland cliche that “it’s never as good or as bad as you think inside the four walls” seems to have been written with the Blues in mind.

The club’s key decision-makers of chief executive Graham Wright, football boss Chris Davies and president Rob Priestley have been, contrary to much of the fan base, realistic and measured throughout this vexed season.

They did not make any pledges about Voss when I spoke to them in March, suggesting that he had to show improvement across the board to keep his job.

Yes, they have been ruthless, not just in parting with Voss, but also list manager Nick Austin on the same day.

If you didn’t know the circumstances, it was easy to assert that “Carlton have done it again” with Voss moving on mid-season. Realistically, the coach was odds against to survive after 2025, and the Blues allowed him to continue in full recognition that they could dip.

That they retained Voss into this season is a selling point to the next coach that they will have a fair crack at the role.

Wright had set the bar at making the top 10 as their ladder ambition. Results under Fraser confirm that was a reasonable expectation. Shifts in game style – such as higher handball tallies and more sharing and running – have been less critical than the revival of senior players Cripps, Harry McKay, Jacob Weitering and Sam Walsh, and the unshackling of a team that played with dread (when ahead) rather than dare.

Acknowledging personal guilt about his failure to produce his best for Voss, Weitering told SEN on Saturday, “Within the club, the conversations are the same. It’s as stable as it’s been”.

This isn’t a mere outbreak of sober realism at a club that’s often judged coaches and executives harshly. It is the nuanced nature of those key people, in particular Wright and Davies, who have seen it all from their previous positions at Hawthorn and Collingwood (Wright) and Port Adelaide (Davies).

Accordingly, the Carlton coaching position – previously as secure as 21st century Australian prime ministers – should be viewed as attractive by the candidates who will soon jockey for it.

While the quality of playing lists heavily determine coaches’ fates – compare Alastair Clarkson 12 years ago to his past three years – the quality and experience of the helming the ship is even more influential.

The Blues have added Adam Simpson to their coach-search panel, who are open-minded about the candidates, but Wright’s Collingwood modus operandi – when he and Collingwood opted for Craig McRae over Adam Kingsley, Jaymie Graham and Voss (after approaching Sam Mitchell first) – suggests that they’ll happily hire from the pool of premium assistant coaches, such as Corey Enright (St Kilda), Graham (Fremantle), James Kelly (Geelong), and whoever else they fancy.

The playing list has holes aplenty. But they will gain father-son gun Cody Walker at season’s end, a prospective pick No.1 or 2, and can build around Walker, Harry Dean, Jagga Smith and a raft of youngsters who have shown promise, including Jack Ison and the injured Harry O’Farrell and Matt Carroll.

Trading Charlie Curnow and losing free agents Tom De Koning and Jack Silvagni creates major cap space for aggressive pursuits once Walker and others have been acquired via the draft.

A month ago, the journey ahead seemed almost as arduous as that facing Essendon and Richmond. Today, the Carlton coaching position that nightwatchman Fraser occupies shapes as one of the competition’s more attractive propositions – and challenges – rather than the one that burnt Voss’ many predecessors.

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