Carlton Supporters Club

This is true, let’s not forgot who we played, we are not in their "league".

The ch 7 commentary team and coverage and telecast has been as putrid as the umpiring.

At least the boys are having a crack.

Clearly not at the same class level as the lions.....but....they are at least giving a stuff

We'll be lucky to win another game this year!!!

It seemed to me that Pagan and Malthouse had been successful, at least in part, due to well-established dictatorial imposition of inflexible game plans over multiple seasons but that they struggled to transpose those systems to Carlton - although Pagan was also adversely affected by the AFL-imposed draft penalties. The Pagan references in Kouta's book were also consistent with the atmosphere around the club at the time.

Conversely, Ratten and Teague came to the club as assistant coaches who were impressively hands-on in the skill development of individual players and both seemed to benefit from the personal relationships that they developed with the players.

I think in Pagan's case, he had Carey and he had Archer, and that made a huge difference because it greatly diminished the opinions of the rest. But that might be normal for any club.

In all my years in and around football clubs, I've never found a club with undisputed and unequivocal unity, such claims usually come retrospectively after a flag or other similar success, but they are a mirage.

So perhaps losing some players is normal, and it is who you lose that makes all the difference.

But I'd still assert, if the top leadership and by top I mean above the coach, is stable, consistent and gives the coach unconditional support. Usually issues never grow beyond a seed. Whiteants live in rot.

Not every North player was enamoured about Pagan and his methods. I've heard Adam Simpson describe some of his "coaching" in less than glowing terms and Corey McKernan was not a fan either - he left to come to us, and checked out again when Pagan came across to us.  There's two examples straight off the bat.
Kouta writes about it in detail in his book.  It was 1980s hard ass coaching for a 2000s group that didn't respond to that approach.  Some people would call them "soft", others would say they were independent enough to not unthinkingly swallow abuse and BS.
Pagan was the kind of coach you played to spite, not to because he was your mate.