Why 2022 is a series of 'what ifs' for Carlton

What if Carlton don’t make finals in 2022?

More than any other year, it feels as though Carlton’s season will be defined by and judged using the overarching theme of finals and ‘what ifs’.

Last season was pretty shambolic, which feels like an all too familiar adjective for the Blues for a long while.

The results were awful, the coach was sacked and the Blues were officially under new management on a board and coaching level by the end of 2021.

2022 is not only a new chapter in the book of Carlton, but also a season that brings great expectation.

For years, internal murmurings that the expectation of this club was to make finals felt like peacocking at best and delusions of grandeur at worse.

Now, the list looks more well-rounded and they’ve brought in a legendary figure of the game with a background in finals footy to help this team graduate to the next step.

We have seen an entire preseason of training, intra-club contests and most recently a pre-season match to give us some sort of indication of what to expect when the season proper commences in less than a week.

(Photo by Robert Cianflone/Getty Images)

Tickets for the Blues’ hype train are being sold as we speak, following the strong performance and subsequent victory over the reigning premiers in the AAMI Community Series contest.

It was an extremely impressive performance that caught the eye of many and has already altered the opinion of pundits heading into the season proper.

We must ask ourselves though, what if Carlton’s win over the Demons was a mirage?

Of course, all we can judge is what we see in front of us, and given the Blues had 72 more disposals, 71 more uncontested possessions, 11 more marks, 23 more clearances, seven more inside 50s and 14 more tackles than the champions of the league, the victory was far more dominant than the late flurry of Demons goals indicated.

The match was won without Carlton’s two best players, Sam Walsh and Jacob Weitering.

If this is what we’re going to get from last season’s 13th-placed team, they’ll be contenders for the top end of the table.

It’s hard to imagine a club so engulfed in mediocrity for the better part of a decade can completely change its fortunes in one summer, particularly off a single pre-season result.

More appropriately, we can assess the style of play used by the Blues and assess the sustainability, and perhaps the legitimacy of it, heading into the Richmond game next Thursday.

(Photo by Quinn Rooney/Getty Images)

Such dominance on the outside with clean ball use and retention looked so foreign yet so accomplished against the Demons and resulted in much more convincing wins from the midfield and far better transitional play from defence.

Granted, it hardly seemed as though the Demons were at their most attentive and hungry, but the Blues took the match seriously and flexed a muscle that didn’t exist in 2021, when they averaged 16 fewer disposals, 3.7 fewer inside 50s, 7.8 fewer tackles and 215 fewer metres gained per game than their opposition.

The Blues of 2021 were ranked dead last for disposals and had the second fewest uncontested possessions, operating at the third worst disposal efficiency across the competition.

While the players weren’t exactly under the pressure they’ll face in Round 1, it was extremely encouraging to see the contested bulls Patrick Cripps, Matt Kennedy and George Hewett win so much outside ball and use it to an elite level.

In reality, what we can take from Carlton’s performance against the Demons is that there is a definitive shift in intent and that can only be a positive.

Given, we’re faced with the traditional Round 1 contest between the Blues and the Tigers in a matter of days, it’s only natural to ask what if Carlton actually beat Richmond?

Well, this hasn’t happened since Nick Duigan polished off a salad sandwich and kicked four goals for the ninth-placed Blues in the infamous 2013 elimination final.

That’s 11 losses in a row against the Tigers and it hasn’t been closer than a four-goal margin since 2016.

Snapping that streak to kick of 2022 would send the sort of message that the stakeholders have been pleading for, giving the Blues a win in the first two rounds for the first time since 2012.

(Photo by Dylan Burns/AFL Photos via Getty Images)

But more than just a nice result, Carlton beating a Richmond team that tackles and hunts the opposition like prey would indicate that the Blues played with cooler heads and the style of play shown against the Demons, where clean ball use and finding space through the middle was important, is sustainable.

I would expect Carlton to win the clearance battle, but how they use the ball from that point and how they spread from the contest is the true indicator.

Between Rounds 3 and 9, the Blues would then enter most games as favourites and confident of beating every opponent they have.

There is, of course, the distinct possibility that Richmond make it a 12th win in a row against Carlton and the age-old question directed at the coach.

What if Michael Voss isn’t the right man for Carlton?

Scepticism was warranted at the time of appointment. The Lions were a relatively mediocre team under the control of Voss and at his time at Port Adelaide, the Power had a bunch of prolific midfielders in the home-and-away season, but as a club, never looked like more than a good regular season team.

(Photo by Will Russell/AFL Photos via Getty Images)

Perhaps new president Luke Sayers thought the club was too scarred from the David Teague appointment and couldn’t justify trying a new coach. Maybe established Carlton figures demanded a well-respected figure of the AFL, so the face of the operation would be well-known.

In limited opportunities, Voss has done the right things.

Defensively, this team has been farcical more often than not due to a one-on-one system that barely scraped by given the heroic nature of the league’s best key defender, Jacob Weitering.

Disjointed and regularly dysfunctional, Voss has made the simple moves needed to at least provide a better outlook for the team.

Moving Mitch McGovern back and allowing him to develop as an intercept marking option was such an obvious adjustment that, after years of not doing it, it almost seems bold that Voss finally pulled the trigger.

Now that there’s aerial assistance in defence, the Blues can immediately leave the full-on one-on-one style and let the help defence drive the system.

Emphasising ball use through the middle and playing the likes of Zac Fisher and Lochie O’Brien as distributors outside the contest, with Adam Cerra playing a rounded role, will only improve the service for a dangerous forward line.

It seems like Voss wants his forwards to be on the end of good kicking and his small forwards to tackle hard.

These little adjustments are remarkably simple, but needed to be done. Teague could’ve been given a senior assistant and figured this out himself, but at least Voss has started off on the right foot.

Most crucially though, the 46-year-old is new to the gig at Carlton and as strange as it seems, the board needs to be patient.

Which circles us back to our initial question, what if Carlton don’t make finals in 2022?

It’s more unlikely than likely, that the Blues will finish in the top eight.

(Photo by Quinn Rooney/Getty Images)

More than just basic assumptions based on the last eight seasons of football, this is a group that has consistently been devoid of confidence and consistency that to think they’ll win 13 games and dig in when the going gets tough is a bridge too far.

Not making finals, though, is not necessarily a bad thing.

Instead of being so results driven, a staple of the Carlton identity, the club needs to be as realistic as its fans, and look for progress in the right direction.

Cripps’ pre-season looked superb and he looks fitter than ever, but that’s been seen before and he hasn’t made it through the year. Now that he has support and isn’t the sole clearance player, using him more intelligently and protecting his body in attack would be a smart move.

Nailing the defensive pattern and driving down scores conceded and even better, the efficiency of scores from opposition from inside 50s, could be the single best indicator of a team preparing itself for finals.

It’d be nice if Charlie Curnow stays on the park and forms a great combination with Harry McKay, which would be a first at the peak of their powers.

Without a doubt, Sam Docherty’s story and return to senior footy will be the mental boost and perspective that this playing group will thrive on.

Expecting a coach to come in and be able to create immediate, finals-worthy efficiency in all three areas of the ground with a playing group that hasn’t been together for all that long is fraught with danger and a path that Carlton shoot themselves in the foot on just a couple of steps in.

Many will need to temper their expectations on the Blues and preaching patience to the team’s stakeholders is like trying to sell a meat platter to a vegan restaurant.

But the club doesn’t look like a finals quality team yet and finishing ninth-11th shouldn’t necessarily be seen as a bust of a season.

This year should be seen as a year for progress at the Blues, an opportunity for true change to start this new chapter.

2022 should be defined by how Carlton can answer the ‘what ifs’ that will be thrown the club’s way.

If fans can see the brighter side in the answer, then it’s a job well done.