Agree with all that has been posted. And what was Eddie doing in the last half trying to take spekkies instead of staying down and crumbing the packs?
Lack of discipline, fumbling, dreadful decision making -we've seen it all before. Then we come to Murphy and Gibbons. Both lacked penetration with their inability to keep the ball low and kicking no further than 40 metres.
The Hawk's midfield carved us up time and time again with long precision kicking to position that showed just what a rabble we become when pressure is applied.
The general view on this thread re Callum Moore is that he is not up to AFL standard and put in a shocker today.
I had never seen him play until today and agree that he was a liability and completely overawed by the occasion.
However, it was his first game and he was not the only forward to go missing today.
Given his height and weight, are we being too quick to dismiss him? I keep looking for another Mitch Robinson - somebody who puts in all day and takes the pressure off our lighter built players.
What a great win. I was particularly pleased with the efforts of Kennedy and Setterfield in the midfield. They had a real presence and were not pushed aside the way Murphy and Fisher are so often.
It's the first time in quite a while we have played a few games without being hit by injuries and the players are showing real progress with a settled team
Also , congratulations to Harry. I've been very critical of him in recent weeks and it's nice to get four quarters of good football from him.
So good to see a bit of mongrel, fewer turnovers, and such a positive spirit.
Yet we continue recycling the same rubbish as though it's a reward for no effort or effect in games that clearly warranted their demotion in the first place ... or the second .. or the third. That's a very big part of our problem. It's harder to be left out of the side than it is to get in.
Is it because the selectors have no option? Are they faced with a further group of players who will never make it in the firsts? If so, what an indictment on our selectors .
Harry is a perfect example of our problem. He has all the physical attributes to succeed and when recruited great things were held for his future. He has been around long enough and is old enough to have a successful future, yet time and again all I see is a player who is thick between the ears and getting games when instead he needs a kick up the proverbial.
The same attitude is held by Cunningham, and others - whether you do well or not, you'll be selected next week.
This attitude seems to
I guess I'm in a dirty mood and as I'll NEVER give up on Carlton, I expect more after 25 years stuck in the mud and 60 in support, I think I'm entitled to think as I do.
I could cop last night's result if we had a list sprinkled with a few b graders and the rest c and d graders who gave their all every week but whose lack of ability caused us to be beaten by better sides week in week out.
What I can't cop is a side with so many top picks that displays mental and/or physical fragility week in week out. We never know who is going to turn up at any given match.
We have not had one match where the majority of players have given their best for the whole game.
It's like Groundhog Day. Go back to match review threads of six years or more, before the rebuild, and the complaints then were the same as now.
We supporters deserve better. Carlton this century reminds me of Melbourne in the last 45 years of last century: promised the Pot of Gold at the end of the Rainbow but always just out of reach.
Until we recruit a few players in the mid-field such as Mitch Robinson who will play with aggression all day and not take a backward step, we will continue to be pushed around and anchored to the bottom of the ladder.
I worry about putting De Koning in the ruck. He has the height but must be giving away 20kg in weight to the likes of Gawn etc. My concern is that as he tires he'll be pushed aside and have little impact in a game.
I haven't seen him this year but have had the impression he will not bulk up as he ages and will always have a light frame.
Would we be better off developing him as a forward position player?
Interesting points made by Pauly and Blue Moon. I agree that "above the shoulders" plays a very important part in a team's culture.
However, surely that is affected directly by the ability - or lack of -of the players. How many times in recent years have we seen forward thrusts fail because of the inability of players to kick properly, or failing to kick to the forwards advantage or to make the right choice, only to have the ball turned over and our backline hammered once again.
During the Covid break I watched all of the 1995 Carlton games, and the contrast with today's team stood out like the proverbial. No wonder our players stood tall. They had a belief in themselves to win because they had the mental attitude brought about by their skills.
The players were able to control a game because they could retain possession of the ball and use it to best advantage.
I suppose it's the chicken or the egg question, but I believe without skills so many opportunities are squandered, games are lost with monotonous regularity, and it's not possible to develop that essential positive mental attitude.
Five years ago at the beginning of the 2016 season we all bought the story that, following a rebuild, we long-suffering supporters would reach that great big shining light at the end of the tunnel.
We believed that by 2020 we would be serious contenders for the flag, well entrenched in the top 8.
So where are we? We have a side that is still incapable of playing four quarters of consistent football. We are so desperate for any signs of success that we seem to be happy if we can get a medium/maximum effort for three quarters of a game and hope the side can get off the bottom of the ladder.
I have just re-read this thread, and clearly we have so many problems I don't know where to start.
Motivation is lacking. So few of our players are desperate for the ball. It's like watching our old side before the re-build when players such as Gibbs would roll up and play bruise free football. Basic skills such as making tackles stick, and the ability to kick, are missing week in, week out. There is no mongrel in the side.
How is it that with so many early draft picks we are still so short of players with football nous and skills?
I hate being negative but realistically when are we ever going to stop being the bottom feeders of the AFL?
When does the agony end? I am over so-called gallant second halves that still leave us without the four points.
It doesn't matter who the coach is, we still present the same garbage week in week out. Dreadful decision making. Dreadful kicking to position. Aside from Weitering and Jones, how many of our players can kick 40 metres or more with accuracy and penetration?
And the last 3 minutes of the game showed the weakness and immaturity in so many of our players with them looking as though they had stage fright and crumbling under pressure.
Our last visit to the US was late last year when my wife and I visited a number of midwest and southwest states. Without exception we found people to be kind and courteous, and without exception they believed the US to be the greatest country in the world.
The vast majority in the fifty to seventy five age group were rusted on Trump followers. Many listened every morning to Rush Limbaugh because "he is able to take complex matters and simplify them for us".
Few had been overseas and quite a number had not ventured outside their own state.
There was a superficial interest in Australia and Europe, possibly because of their lack of knowledge. Free to air tv usually concentrated on local and state matters with Fox providing right wing views almost entirely related to the US.
We were left speechless at the end of a Diana Ross concert in Las Vegas when the middle aged couple sitting behind us queried our accent. When we said we were from Australia the wife said she had never heard of it.
Years ago I was told that the US is a first world country with a third world underbelly. I've seen nothing to change that view
