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Carlton captain Marc Murphy remains unsigned for the 2019 Australian Football League season and speculation has begun to swirl that he will pursue premiership success at another club.
According to Fox Footy, Murphy is seeking a two-year contract extension from Carlton but the issue remains unresolved.
Murphy is currently 30 years old, playing in his 13th season at the top level and finds himself under a serious injury cloud.
Carlton suffered a triple-figure crushing at the hands of Melbourne in Round 9 and Murphy left the ground late in the first quarter with a foot injury.
While Murphy would later return to the ground and complete the match, he remains in doubt for the Round 10 contest with Geelong.
2018 is shaping up to be another disastrous season for Carlton – currently parked in 18th spot on the ladder with a single win for the season.
Carlton has failed to kick 100 points in a single match for 42 consecutive rounds. The last time the Blues managed to do was in Round 11 of the 2016 season.
Marc Murphy of the Blues looks dejected (Photo by Michael Willson/AFL Media/Getty Images)
Brendon Bolton is slowly but surely being put to the sword by the media, forced to take accountability for his side’s lack of development since last season, and as captain Marc Murphy should be standing alongside him.
Murphy was drafted to Carlton in 2005, taken at pick number one, and became captain in 2013.
While it’s fair to ask questions about his quality as a player in comparison to the rest of the competition, as a member of the Blues brigade he’s offered plenty – winning multiple best and fairest awards, polling more than 100 Brownlow Medal votes and booting 170 goals in a 240-game career.
When it comes to the idea of leaving there’s a lot of important factors to weigh up, all loosely referenced above.
In club history, Carlton has rarely reached the abysmal, rock-bottom levels of performances it’s currently offering up week to week. As captain, is it really just for Murphy to leave the club now and seek success elsewhere?
On the other hand football is a team sport. Murphy has offered a huge percentage of his playing career to Carlton. While he plays a role in the way things have unfolded, it’s not entirely on him.
Essendon premiership forward Matthew Lloyd (a one-club player) weighed in on the issue during the week.
“He has been a great Carlton man, but sometimes you have to be selfish and think, ‘What’s best for me? What do I want to achieve out of football?’,” Lloyd said.
“I think Marc Murphy would be sensational at another club. I still think he’s got the burst speed and ability to perform.
“I’d put the selfish hat on and get out of Carlton to see if I could achieve a premiership in the next couple of years.”
It’s a view that’s easy to understand. Murphy’s career isn’t far from over and Carlton isn’t climbing into premiership contention any time soon.
He wouldn’t be the first club leader this decade to bail either – and honestly, the results speak for themselves.
Western Bulldogs captain Ryan Griffen departed the club in a dramatic off-field change in October of 2014, leaving for Greater Western Sydney.
Since then Griffin has failed to hold a senior position at the Giants and the Western Bulldogs won a premiership in 2016.
Richmond vice captain Brett Deledio made a similar move at the end of 2016.
Richmond missed out on finals all together in 2016 after playing consecutively from 2013-15 and struggling with injury but still a clear star, Deledio made the move from Richmond to Greater Western Sydney.
Former Richmond Tigers player Brett Deledio (AAP Image/Julian Smith)
Richmond won the premiership in 2017, crushing Deledio and his new Giants squad in the preliminary final round.
Deledio has spoken publicly about the pain of watching his original club enjoy success without him and it’s a story Murphy needs to pay close attention to.
“I’ve watched every grand final for the last few years for motivation. It was just so raw, the emotion of it all,” Deledio said in October following the finals series.
“I made the decision (not to watch) … out of fear of it getting to me mentally. Pretty gut-wrenching.
“(I’ve seen) the photos of the boys celebrating, they were some of my best mates.
“That was really tough to go through everything we did and the work we’d done in previous years and to see them celebrating when I felt like I could have or should have been a part of (that) was really tough.”
With that said, the chances of Carlton rocketing to success remain slim and he’s unlikely to suffer the same pain. But, you never know.
There’s precedent beyond the AFL for Murphy to make the move – his father did the same thing in the VFL.
John Murphy, an AFL Hall of Famer and father of Marc, played more than 200 games at Fitzroy, winning multiple best and fairest awards, before departing for South Melbourne and then North Melbourne in the final years of his career.
It will be interesting to see if Murphy follows in his father’s footsteps or tries a different path.
All things considered from my perspective, Murphy must remain at the club under the circumstances the club offer him. Carlton is in a deep, dark pit and Murphy was on board when they dug the hole – he should be on board to help build the ladder to get them out of there.
But at the end of the day the only person’s opinion who matters is Murphy’s.
Whatever the choice, he will be the only one to have to live with the experience and its repercussions and he should follow his own judgement and intuition.
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