It’s probably time that we, rather than excitedly pointing at what Carlton could be, accept what they are, and likely will remain.

The truth is that the Blues, in their current form, are not a premiership contender. They’re a side with some of the most fearsome weapons in the AFL, but otherwise hobbled by serious limitations in crucial areas, areas that good sides like Brisbane relentlessly and remorselessly expose.

Those weapons were on full display in a slashing first quarter on Friday night, and then again in a scintillating final quarter that would have broken a lot of teams going around. But the Lions, playing their best footy of the season and re-establishing themselves as a genuine premiership threat, constantly hung tough, rode out the periods of Blue dominance and retained scoreboard parity; then, in the second and third quarters, capitalised on their opponents’ lulls with incredible efficiency.

A 20-point win probably sums this up: the Lions and Blues each shared periods of dominance, but the Lions were far more damaging with theirs. In result but certainly not in execution, it was a match remarkably similar to the Blues’ recent loss to St Kilda at Marvel Stadium, the other serious contender they’ve faced at home this season.

This was a wonderful win by Brisbane, one made even more impressive by the absence of their prime backline mover Daniel Rich and the exquisite Dayne Zorko, neither of whose absence did anything to curb the quality of their ball movement when it mattered most.

Jack Payne, who might only be playing now due to Marcus Adams’ ongoing battle with concussion, confirmed his rapid improvement in 2023 with a career game curtailing Charlie Curnow, who by the third quarter was roaming as far and wide as half-back to get his kicks. Josh Dunkley, too, hasn’t played a better game in this colours, comprehensively bossing an alarmingly lacklustre Patrick Cripps at the coalface.

Up forward, Charlie Cameron gave Nic Newman, who after seven rounds was in All-Australian form as a small defender, an almighty bath; almost as good was Zac Bailey, a sprightly forward-midfielder of the type Michael Voss would surely sell a kidney for.

With four goals apiece, a sizeable portion coming out the back having beaten their direct opponents for sheer pace in the fashion the Lions have become renowned for in recent years, they were the matchwinners.

But let’s be honest – the Blues, at this stage of their development, really should expect to be beating or at least matching stride for stride even the highest-quality interstate teams on their own turf – not turning for home 40 points down, for all they proved capable of in a final term that only needed a few goals shaved off the starting margin to become majorly threatening. And the fact they didn’t is worth a closer look.

You can look at the Blues, and their Curnow-Harry McKay forward pairing, a midfield packed with bulls led by Patrick Cripps and with the silky-smooth Sam Walsh in everything, and a backline marshalled around a monster in Jacob Weitering who has never played in a system that gives him the chance to be as good as he could be, and wonder how they’re not a powerhouse.

Outside that, though, the problems become clear. While ferocious at the contest, the Blues’ midfield is one-paced and repeatedly exposed in general play on turnover – especially with Cripps as down as he has looked for most of 2023. This in turn exposes a defence that looks impenetrable when given high, pressured balls to cut off with intercept marks, but repeatedly crumbles in the face of quick, aggressive ball movement or even something as simple as the ball hitting the ground.

Charlie Cameron of the Lions celebrates a goal. (Photo by Dylan Burns/AFL Photos via Getty Images)

Up forward, if you stop McKay and Curnow – and McKay’s kicking for goal frequently renders him a non-factor – there is no one to step up and produce a bag like Bailey did. In fact, it’s even worse than that – if neither of the twin towers mark inside 50, then there’s no one you can reliably bank on crumbing the loose ball.

Sure, the likes of Corey Durdin and Jesse Motlop put on plenty of pressure and repeatedly force stoppages – but unlike the Lions, the Blues just aren’t great at scoring from that source. This year, the big two have 43 goals, while the rest of the team combined has 54.

It’s something they finally seemed to work out in the final term – all five of their goals came from other sources, with Durdin and Motlop each kicking one and space aplenty opened up inside 50. Replicate that across quarters two and three, and they win this game.

But across those two quarters, the Blues were far too predictable: long ball under heavy Lions pressure to Curnow and McKay, and when the spoil came there were no other options. Just one goal across those two quarters, to the Lions’ seven, was the tale of the tape.

It was most obvious in the second quarter, with the Blues controlling territory with 11 inside 50s to eight, yet managing just the one goal – coming about, as it happened, from one of the few times they targeted someone other than McKay or Curnow inside 50.

Whether it was deliberate I’ll leave up to you – off-balance and under pressure, Alex Cincotta’s scrambled kick inside 50 sailed over the head of McKay, who had two Lions in his vicinity, and didn’t quite make it to Curnow in the goalsquare. But the new direction of the kick scrambled the Lions at ground level, and thanks to a fortuitous series of bounces, ended in Curnow dishing to Motlop, who made the most of the split-second he had the ball in his possession to goal.

The Blues’ strength at stoppages was likewise curtailed, trailing clearances 22-26 at half time despite Marc Pittonet, the game’s best ruckman by hitouts to advantage numbers, dominating the taps. Interestingly, despite dominating post-clearance contested possessions 47-33 at the break, the pre-clearance count was more even – usually it’s reversed for the Blues.

The problem here was twofold: Dunkley’s dominance, combined with Cripps’ underwhelming night, prevented the Blues from getting their hands on the ball at the source. It meant chances to score from centre bounces, by which they scored their first goal of the night, became few and far between, enabling the Lions to fan back in waves and prevent one-out chances for Curnow or McKay.

When it was the Lions’ turn to attack, the Blues were always more vulnerable, most obviously in an ugly collective lapse in the second term where, with nearly every player inside their defensive 50, they somehow left enough space in a dangerous position for Jack Gunston to lead into for an invaluable goal.

The midfield battle was an intriguing game of cat and mouse all night: at first, the Lions pushed winger Jarrod Berry regularly into the stoppages to create an outnumber, with the result Blues wingman Blake Acres given the space to rack up 10 disposals and 188 metres gained to quarter time. But down in the clearances to the first break, the Blues chose to equalise Berry at the coalface with an extra number of their own, usually George Hewett or Adam Cerra pushing up from the forward line, thereby leaving a free man who was seldom found too far away from the big two.

But it wasn’t at stoppages that cruelled the Blues all evening: it was their ball use in their defensive half. They conceded 13 goals to seven from defensive half intercepts: the match writ small.

Modern footy is a turnover game, and the Blues fall victim to it more often than not. Part of it, I believe, is system: unlike St Kilda, the Blues don’t really have a set strategy in moving the ball forward. They don’t play the boundaries and look to protect themselves behind the ball, but neither do they go bull at a gate down the corridor and try to get the ball as quickly as possible to their tall timber.

The result is, too often, careful chips around the defensive half until – and the Blues have no real design on who it is – someone tries to bite off an ambitious kick to open the field up, like Jacob Weitering tried to do late in the first quarter with the Blues, more or less, in control. Far too often for a side with premiership aspirations, it’s that kick that kills them.

The Lions weren’t better with the ball – they produced 78 turnovers to 74 for the evening – but they protect themselves far, far better. For one thing, they seldom attack the corridor unless it’s staring them in the face, preferring instead to head down the wings; for another, their ball movement is pacy enough that should they botch a kick, most of their players are still in good enough defensive positions to neutralise contests with the ball coming back their way. Most of their turnovers, as a result, come forward of the ball; they gave up just 18 defensive half intercepts to the Blues’ 29.

In attack as well, the Lions knew their stuff. Playing perfectly into their hands is that Newman, the Blues’ premier small defender, is vulnerable one-on-one. Heading into the match, from nine defensive 50 mano e mano contests, he’d lost four, comfortably worse than Weitering (5 from 30), or the Lions’ number one small, Brandon Starcevich (3 from 12).

Cameron is a menace as soon as the ball hits the ground, and ingenious with his body positioning against defenders his own size. He’s not a player you can comfortably leave on an island, as happened far too often on Friday night. The very best teams just don’t let this sort of thing happen, with the Lions finishing with five goals from within 15 metres of the big sticks chiefly due to Cameron’s isolation.

It’s one of the myriad of ways in which you can beat Carlton. You can, like Adelaide, smash them for contested ball, expose their midfield for pace out of the centre, and get good looks with dangerous forwards, if you’ve got those weapons. If not, you can do as St Kilda did, and batten down the hatches defensively when the Blues are at their most powerful on the ball, then kill them on the turnover when they lapse at last.

For the Lions, it was a bit of both.

So, where do the Blues go from here? Perhaps the answer lies in the final term, where, as the Lions’ frenetic pressure finally began to ebb through fatigue, they started to find open space ahead of them inside 50, particularly on the opposite side. You could regularly see one or even two Blues free in the opposite forward pocket to where the contest was; the Lions simply lacked the energy to go with them. It would have been decisive had the Blues not needed at least seven final-quarter goals to hit the front.

The Blues had a whopping 18 inside 50s to 11 in the final quarter, and with five goals, their efficiency was fine as well. Injected into the midfield mix in the final quarter, Matt Kennedy was superhuman with 13 disposal, a goal and 306 metres gained, exposing the knackered Lions with fresh legs.

Quite genuinely, many lesser teams wouldn’t have been able to cope. But the Lions were good enough to, unlike the Blues in the third term, weather the storm: be it a strong intercept mark from the superb Payne, a timely spoil from a desperate Dunkley, or any number of crucial tackles that denied the Blues the decisive ball movement they desperately needed, there were key plays everywhere.

In many ways, the Blues are what the Lions have been accused of being for years: a team loaded with talent but found wanting in key areas against the true big dogs.

Through effort, tactics and trading, the Lions have addressed the most glaring of those deficiencies. It’s over to Carlton to see whether they can do the same in the weeks and years to come.