Early Tackle: Scott Gullan names his likes and dislikes from Round 15 of the AFL season
On this date last year, Carlton sat second on the ladder. After what happened on Saturday, the Blues can no longer dismiss the hysteria as supporter angst – it’s real, writes SCOTT GULLAN.
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We’re less than halfway through Round 15, but there has been no shortage of talking points.
What does Scott Gullan think of what has transpired?
He names his likes and dislikes here.
DISLIKES
THE VOSS EQUATION
The hysteria will want Michael Voss sacked and on what Carlton served up in a season-defining match against North Melbourne, angry Blues fans will have plenty of right to vent.
But this time Carlton’s powerbrokers can’t just dismiss it as supporter angst, there is now a real body of work which has to bring the coach’s position under serious review.
Incoming CEO Graham Wright doesn’t officially take over until October but he will be called on to make the biggest decision of his new career before that.
In many ways, it’s probably a good thing that the new boss gets a chance to make an early statement as he doesn’t bring any emotional connections with Voss that will cloud his judgement.
What Wright will see is that Carlton has lost 15 of its last 23 games and, of those eight wins, only one is against a top-eight team.
For a list which has been spruiked as a potential premiership winning outfit since an incredible run to the preliminary final in 2023, Voss’ second year in the job, those stats are damning.
Injuries to Harry McKay and Sam Walsh can’t be used as excuses against the 16th ranked Kangaroos who Carlton flogged by 82 points two months ago.
What Voss can’t escape is that while most of the competition has changed their game style to suit the modern game, he has stuck with a contested model which is slow and laborious.
Maybe that has more to do with the list build but not recognising that bombing it long to McKay and Charlie Curnow isn’t the answer anymore continues to hurt him.
Three-and-a-half seasons is enough time to put your stamp on a team and that’s the issue Wright will have when assessing Voss.
Wright is known as an “agent of change” and, at Collingwood, one of his first jobs as football boss was the exiting of Nathan Buckley from the senior coaching job. He did it in a respectful way which impressed many as did him not shying away from making the hard call.
Carlton can’t make the finals now so the question the Blues board needs to address is the merits of acting now or later. Trotting out another review of the football department won’t cut it with an increasingly angry supporter base.
Something has to give before this group of players misses their premiership window. Captain Patrick Cripps is 30 and seemingly struggling with his body again, Curnow is 28, McKay and Jacob Weitering are 27 while Walsh turns 25 in two weeks.
And then there is Tom De Koning, the superstar ruckman who has been offered a ‘Godfather’ deal by St Kilda and while there are noises he desperately wants to stay with his mates and forgo millions, performances like this one on Saturday must cloud that thinking.
Incredibly, Carlton was sitting second on this exact day last year – June 21 – after thrashing Geelong at the MCG on a Friday night by 63 points.
The following week they beat a struggling Richmond by 61 points and then the wheels inexplicably fell off.
What has changed in those 12 months is ultimately on Voss and the Carlton hierarchy needs to put their big boy pants on and decide whether they allow it to continue.
TRUST NO MORE
Just when you want to give Port Adelaide some love they go and produce a performance which leaves you cursing non-stop at the TV screen.
Beating GWS in Canberra and then comfortably taking care of Melbourne had Port fans understandably thinking the season wasn’t dead and buried.
And with another two home games in a row against Sydney, who have been totally out-of-sorts this year, and a struggling Carlton was a reason for optimism.
But Port did what Port too often does. They do things which don’t make sense, their best players go missing at the wrong time and they find a way to make scoring very difficult.
At their best the Power are electric with their ball movement fast and decisive. When they’re off their tucker, it’s haphazard and embarrassing.
They only went inside 50m 35 times which is 17 below their average and 16 behind what they allowed Sydney to do.
Too many good players had off nights. Jason Horne-Francis only had 16 touches, Willem Drew 17, Miles Bergman 14, Darcy Byrne-Jones 12 while Willie Rioli kicked one goal from seven possessions.
BLUEPRINT CATS
Geelong has enough credits in the bank for coach Chris Scott to dismiss getting flogged by the reigning premiers on their home deck as just one of those nights where nothing went right.
They’ve earnt that but Scott continually tells us that what he says in the media and what he does behind closed doors are often a lot different.
While losing their third game in a row to Brisbane is a concern, it’s more the way it happened that would have the Cats coach slightly concerned.
Twice this year at GMHBA Stadium, a team has come with a distinct plan to upset the Cats game style and have been successful.
The GWS Giants continued their remarkably good record there in Rd 9 by zipping all over the place and consistently beating the Cats out the back.
Brisbane arrived having not won at the venue in 22 years with a specific plan. They were going to lower their eyes, look to the corridor and under no circumstances kick it long into the forward line and into the hands of Tom Stewart, the Cats defensive quarterback.
They also knew they batted deeper in the midfield so if Max Holmes and Bailey Smith were kept relatively in check, they’d back their own premiership mids to get it done and basically deny the Cats the ball.
Geelong averages 348 possessions per game this year, on Friday night they only had 314 and there were plenty of big names who couldn’t get hold of the ball.
Rising Star Ollie Dempsey had 10 touches as did Shaun Mannagh, Mark Blicavs, Oisin Mullin and starting sub Ollie Henry while Zac Guthrie, Brad Close, Mitch Duncan and Mark O’Connor didn’t even make it to double figures.
The problem for Scott is that teams who are capable of following a blueprint – obviously there are plenty who aren’t which Geelong kill off easily – are increasingly finding a way and they’re the ones you meet in September.
And that can’t be dismissed as just one of those things.
LIKES
UNSOCIABLE CLARKO
Finally, we see some Alastair Clarkson coming out in North Melbourne.
He built his reputation as one of the best coaches of all-time off the back of his unsociable Hawks who weren’t afraid to cross the line, or at least dance close to it, in the physicality stakes.
North have been down for so long that they haven’t had an opportunity to puff out their chest but with signs the wheels were starting to turn this year, they picked a good time to bring a bit of unsociable football.
Paul Curtis has been one of the Roos shining lights and along with his exquisite skills, he has the happy knack of hurting people with hard tackles and Carlton defender Adam Saad in his sights, not once, but twice which set the tone for the afternoon.
Captain Jy Simpkin has always been keen to get in the face of an opponent and he didn’t miss the opportunity to drill his shoulder into George Hewitt’s ribs when he was left wide open in a bone-jarring tackle late in the third quarter.
For the first time in a while it was obvious North wasn’t going to be pushed around.
While the focus will be rightly on Carlton and its under-siege coach Michael Voss, this was the performance the Kangaroos had to have to justify Clarkson’s belief that he had them on the right track.
The way they moved the ball with speed across the MCG was impressive and into a dangerous forward line of Curtis (two goals), Nick Larkey (one goal) and Cam Zurhaar (three goals).
And more importantly for Roos fans it was two of their young guns who were leading the way in Colby McKercher (29 possessions and two goals) and Harry Sheezel (30 and one goal).
McKercher went at No.2 behind Harley Reid in the 2023 draft and after a solid start to his career there were murmurs about the selection.
Scrap that now because despite all the hype of Reid you could put in an argument about McKercher having the better season right now.
ISAAC TIME
It should come as no surprise the identity of the player who has ensured Sydney’s season has a pulse?
Isaac Heeney deciding whether the Swans win or lose games isn’t anything new but on a night where mediocrity was the best player on the ground, his goal at the start of the last quarter was a clear highlight.
Bad kicking had dominated the game with Sydney continually shooting themselves in the foot led by full-forward Joel Amartey whose eight shots at goal remarkably returned six behinds.
It had the potential to see them blow a game they’d dominated all night. Enter Heeney who was awarded a holding the man free-kick on the half-forward flank in the opening couple of minutes.
He went back and calmly slotted a left-foot (his non-preferred) around-the-corner kick from 35m. It was pure class and made a mockery of what his teammates had been doing all evening.
The inclusions this week of Errol Gulden, Tom Papley and Amartey, the first two from long-term injuries, gave the Swans a completely different look straight away.
While many had written off Dean Cox’s team, they’re now only two games out of the eight and have a good draw over the next month with the Western Bulldogs and Fremantle at the SCG followed by St Kilda at Marvel Stadium and then North Melbourne back at home.
Win all of them and who knows, they could be the Brisbane of last year.
SORRY CAM
Cam Rayner, we’re sorry.
Maybe an apology is a stretch but our patience had worn out about where you fitted in the scheme of things. Yes there have been flashes of brilliance and last year there was some impressive consistency in output and match-winning efforts but there was one fact which always nagged away at us … you didn’t get the ball enough.
Even in an era where possessions are picked up way too easy, the fact you’d never had over 25 touches in your 155-game career didn’t sit right.
Drafted at No.1 in the 2017 draft, you were described as an exciting, powerful midfielder who has the ability to open up games with your pace, strength and agility at stoppages.
In other words you were supposed to be the next Dustin Martin.
But you never moved too far from the half-forward flank in your first few years at Brisbane and that seemed to be your lot in life.
While this was happening there were some who looked back at the draft and noted Andrew Brayshaw at No.2, Luke Davies-Uniacke at No.4, Adam Cerra at No.5 and Ed Richards at No.16 as more than handy midfielders from your crop.
On Friday night against Geelong, you were Dusty.
It was pretty to watch as you made some Cats look like U/12s, brushing them aside with arrogance and force.
Your 19 disposals, which included five clearances and three goals, had more impact than anyone else on the night. Twice you kicked a goal at the start of quarters – the third and fourth – to extinguish any momentum the Cats were hoping to build.
To be fair to us, in the aftermath even your coach Chris Fagan admitted he’d take a while to figure you out.
“We have come to understand him and his strengths. It has taken us a little bit of time and how it all fits in with our system but in the last couple of years we have discovered that,” Fagan said.
And now so have we.
Originally published as Early Tackle: Scott Gullan names his likes and dislikes from Round 15 of the AFL season
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