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AFL football is becoming a ruthless professional business.
An assessment of the Carlton Football Club this year is that they have the worst list in the competition and are further away than any other club from contending for a premiership.
A drastic and futuristic approach to rebuilding the Blues list is needed.
While the backlash of trading captain Marc Murphy, Bryce Gibbs and Matthew Kreuzer at the end of this year would be massive, it is the sort of extreme measure needed to turn around the fortunes of a once mighty club that has struggled for fifteen years.
A lot of people will find the idea of the Blues trading perhaps their three best players and club captain as unthinkable, but an honest look at their list will tell you that none of these players will play in the next Carlton premiership team.
As AFL football continues to evolve, player movement between clubs will increase and “loyalty” between clubs and players will diminish to a point where teams won’t think twice about trading their star players.
In the more professionally advanced American sports such as the NBA and NFL, clubs will often trade their franchise players while they still have value in an attempt to build their next championship team. Comparing the AFL to these American sports is frowned upon in some circles but to think the AFL won’t follow the same path as these is naive.
Along with the No.1 pick the Blues will receive this year from finishing on the bottom of the ladder, trading Murphy, Kreuzer and Gibbs will get the Blues another three top ten picks from the strong 2016 draft.
Add these potential young stars to Patrick Cripps, Jacob Weithering, Harry McKay, Charlie Curnow and Jack Silvagni and you start to build the nucleus of a very good team and give the Blues supporters great hope for the future.
At the moment Carlton have sixteen players on their list that have come from a different club. While some of these players will be great servants to the Carlton Football Club, you can’t build the core of a premiership winning team through the discards of other teams.
A step in the right direction for the Blues was the pick of Jacob Weithering in last year’s draft. Great teams are built around defence and in Weithering the Blues have a great young pillar in which to build their defence around.
While Michael Jamison and Sam Rowe won’t be part of Carlton’s next premiership team they are whole hearted, big bodied defenders that will help with the development of Weithering.
Lachie Plowman was a high draft pick for the Greater Western Sydney giants and while a little undersized for a key position defender, the Blues will be hoping he lives up to his undoubted potential.
In Dylan Buckley and Zach Tuohy the Blues have two players with real dash and dare of half back which can really open up the game and give the Blues much needed unpredictability when moving the ball forward.
There is no use keeping Murphy and Gibbs at the club to mentor the young potential superstar midfielders the Blues have, because apart from Patrick Cripps there aren’t any!
Cripps has already shown last year that he doesn’t need mentoring. He won the club best and fairest and all but carrying the teams midfield on his young shoulders in his second year of football.
The Blues should throw the young man in the deep end give him the captaincy and build their team around him.
Over the last couple of years Carlton has brought to the club Sam Kerridge, Liam Sumner, Dale Thomas, Jason Tutt, Mark Whiley and Matthew Wright to help form the core of their midfield.
However, it is hard to make a case for any of these players becoming top-line midfielders.
Carlton are going to build their forward line around Levi Casboult again this year. While Casboult is a very good mark of the footy and a great competitor, he would ideally be a second or third tall option in a good Forward line.
Watching last year’s early draft pick Harry McKay play this year will be exciting for Blues fans. At 200cm tall, the young forward has good size and comes with unlimited potential.
A real frustration for Carlton has been the form of Liam Jones. The young forward from the Western Bulldogs has been just as disappointing at the Blues as he was at the Bulldogs.
However, a good story for the Blues last year was the form of Andrejs Everitt, who finished the year as the clubs leading goal kicker with 31 majors. Everitt is a versatile big man that can play on a wing or even through the midfield. He adds much needed versatility to the Blues line up.
The Blues added Daniel Gorringe and Andrew Phillips to their ruckmen stocks. Alongside Matthew Kruezer, they form a solid ruck division. It is a real shame the Blues may never see the best of Kruezer. He has the potential to be one of the best ruckmen in the game but his body keeps letting the young man down.
New Carlton coach Brendan Bolton certainly has a big job ahead of him He comes to the Blues from a very professional, successful organisation in Hawthorn, and has been an assistant to the most innovative coach of all time Alastair Clarkson. Hopefully for Blues fans he can bring some of that forward thinking to the Carlton Football Club.
One of the biggest and most successful clubs in the history of the AFL has spent to long in the pits of the AFL ladder. Some tough decisions are needed to wake this sleeping giant and return the fear of playing the mighty navy Blues.
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