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Is it time to start again?

Roar Pro
10th April, 2018
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(Photo by Adam Trafford/AFL Media/Getty Images)
Roar Pro
10th April, 2018
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1163 Reads

Throughout the last three years, the Carlton Football Club have committed to a well-documented rebuild.

But it wasn’t just with the playing list, but also throughout all aspects of the club. In mid-2014, the announcement came down that outgoing president and club legend Stephen Kernahan was stepping down from the role after failing to deliver ultimate success for the club which he set out in 2011 to have added another two premierships to Carlton’s tally by the end of 2015.

This strategic plan was called “The Blue Print”. While Kernahan may not have delivered the ultimate success during his time he had well and truly delivered on the principles in that Blue Print which included a strong financial position, world-class facilities at Princes Park and being a club that listened to its members, gave them what they wanted and gave them that hope which Carlton fans had been craving after five long years in the doldrums on and off the field.

To a degree, Kernahan did deliver the on-field success Carlton fans hoped for by getting the club off the foot of the table and taking the club to finals in 2009, 2010, 2011 and 2013. Memberships were going through the roof too, hitting a record of 50K in 2013, one of just four clubs to do so that year.

However, these achievements weren’t enough for Kernahan it was in the club’s 150th year, 2014, that he and long-serving CEO Greg Swann resigned after a poor on-field start to the 2014 campaign. The replacements would be board member Mark LoGiudice as president and former crows CEO Steven Trigg to take Swann’s role.

The 2015 season, which would be LoGiudice and Trigg’s first full years in office, would be a disaster for the Carlton Football Club in many ways. Many would call it a coincidence that those two happened to be there when the wheels fell off or the fact that they had inherited problems from the previous administration, but the facts were that it was that year after nearly a decade of stability things came crashing down.

The club won the wooden spoon in 2015, had a nasty dispute with coach Mick Malthouse which lead to him being sacked, were given 7 prime time Friday night fixtures (were built from the work over time of Kernahan and Swann to make Carlton a big club again) only to lose each of them by an average of ten goals and had a $2.7 million loss yet rounding out a disastrous year for the club.

In 2013, Kernahan and Swann’s last full year though, Carlton made a profit of $528,095.

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However by the end of 2015, LoGiudice and Trigg were convinced that the issues throughout Carlton had nothing to do with their leadership whatsoever as they announced the club would be taking a three year rebuild in all departments from the list, to the coaches, right throughout the culture of the club completely stamping out the policies of the “Blue Print” which, described by Kernahan were to be “A true blue print for our future, the benchmark for how the Club operates today, tomorrow and in the future” and it was obviously something the members agreed on as it summed up what Carlton was and what it believed in which was seen through the rapid growth of membership numbers.

Yet the new administration believed changing things would be best for the club going forward without even consulting the members whatsoever in any sort of forum.

Some of the new policies have been effective such as a new coach, a new game style and an AFLW licence. But the attitudes within the club over the journey have been completely misguided to what the members actually want. Over the last few years, Carlton has been a bit subject among the media for having a membership problem.

While other clubs such as Geelong and Sydney have gone from the low 40’s and mid 30’s from 2013 to the mid 50’s now, Carlton has continued to struggle during the rebuild years being suck on 50K in 2016 and 2017 and only currently at 48K this year.

At the rate in which other clubs are growing member wise, Carlton probably has more disillusioned members than any other club. Of course, poor results on-field haven’t helped, but even in 2003 Carlton broke a membership record going from 26K to 33K, a year when they finished second last.

Paddy Dow(Photo by Michael Willson/AFL Media/Getty Images)

On field too Carlton have gone backwards since the rebuild finishing 14th in 2016, 16th in 2017 and are currently last on the ladder as we speak. The brutal sacking of CEO Steven Trigg who accomplished those the few achievements in this dark period of time showed yet again how confused it is from what the supporters actually want.

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LoGiudice, however, has stayed despite not going much more than the occasional sponsor announcement or awkward radio interview.

And Carlton wonder why they have a membership problem? The plan to rebuild the list always had to happen at Carlton after 2015, but the way the hierarchy has gone about the rebuild is what is concerning Carlton fans.

Any club wants to see their team do well but Carlton fans have always had that appetite for instant success and being less patient than other clubs after 100 years of aggressive dominance on and off the field.

If the club had just turned over five or ten players who were struggling and let the others develop a new game style developed by coach Brendon Bolton than the rebuild would have gone smoothly. If the club had discussed the rebuild by giving more hope in the short term to the supporters that they would be targeting finals each year with a developing list then the supporters would be flooding through the gates.

It would also give the players more confidence on the field given the expectations. Even if the expectations were unrealistic, they would still keep the Carlton supporters occupied with the club while the secret rebuild happens.

It worked with Kernahan who was aiming for finals right from 2008 despite the team finishing second last the previous year and still had a young list. This gave the team time to properly develop at a steady rate with confidence.

Yet the current attitude of the club even admitting the rebuild will be painful in the short term doesn’t give the supporters much reason to even sign up in the short term while the players are doubtful in that time frame, too.

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Not to mention everything had to go right for an effective long-term which is never guaranteed.

After Carlton’s loss to arch enemy Collingwood on Friday night, Bolton said that “Quite simply, we’ve done what we said we were going to do and what our supporters wanted two years ago” and, “We had to go to the draft – we’ve done that – and we’ve got some young talent in”, yet those words are just echoing the administrations views and not the supporters views.

Neither LoGiudice nor new CEO Cain Liddle have done much at all to engage with the members or ask for their opinion on how the club should be. If they had then they wouldn’t be faced with these membership problems which other clubs don’t and haven’t had.

Proof of this has been Collingwood who have also been faced with similar on-field problems to Carlton in recent years but are continuously able to pull over 60K each year despite having a list which isn’t much better than Carlton.

President Eddie McGuire has engaged with the members though and year after year are targeting finals giving the fans something to hope for, for the current season.

Sure a return to brown paper bags, buying players and sheer arrogance which brought about so much success for Carlton back in the day wouldn’t be appropriate nor very effective in a continually changing AFL society, yet one thing Carlton always was back in the day was being “the best in the business”, on and off the field.

At the moment Carlton are far from that looking year after year at the bottom of the table, a club that doesn’t even listen to its members let alone the outside media and an administration who seem to be taking no responsibility for the problems they have created at the club. A good way to judge how a club is going is actually how it is seen from other fans perspectives.

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Carlton Blues fans celebrate a goal.(Photo by Michael Dodge/Getty Images)

Clubs such as Hawthorn, Richmond and Geelong are hated by many but those same people are also scared and jealous because of how run the clubs are. Carlton, on the other hand, are consistently mocked by the general public for being nothing of the club they once were.

The only way Carlton are going to be able to complete this list rebuild and satisfy supporters in the process is by putting the members’ priority’s first like other clubs have done. Carlton in recent years have tried to adopt a new culture by not being such a “boys club” and trying to attract more female fans, yet even that ploy hasn’t been overly successful which not a huge drive in membership numbers.

Perhaps the female fans of Carlton liked things how they were.

In general, Carlton needs to stop trying to change the fan and the culture of the club and start using those demographics to identify ways to make the club a power. Unlike other clubs, most Carlton fans hold traditional home Princes Park very close to their heart.

This was seen when 18,000 packed into a JLT game against Essendon in 2016, got a lockout of 24K in the first AFLW game at the ground and another 19K this year in the AFLW. Yet the CEO doesn’t support returning AFL games to the venue and favours the upgrade of Etihad Stadium, despite the club only having won 36% of games at the ground.

Fans voted a few years back to be playing fewer games at the ground and more at the MCG, but LoGiudice only increased MCG games by one and has now backed playing even more games at Etihad. Swann however as CEO understood the love for Princes Park among the fans by saying back in 2009 the club would be looking return AFL games to the ground.

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Yet another mistake by the current administration towards its supporters. There is now even talk of an upgrade of the ground which includes demolishing grandstands and making it ideal for AFLW despite more than 70% of Carlton supporters wanting a return to the venue.

Yet the main factor for Carlton fans judge their club on is wins versus losses, like it or not, it is something inbred in the Carlton culture and based on Bolton’s comments which come directly from the president’s message of “be patient”, it is pretty clear the current board doesn’t see eye to eye with their fans.

In order for the rebuild to continue smoothly, the whole of Carlton from the fans, players and board need to be 100% satisfied with the plan and a rebuild which Carlton fans are most asking for starts with the top and a change in hierarchy that actually can be an uniter, not a divider and can act for all parties.

In order to become a power once again on and off the field, it is time for Carlton to start again.

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