Carlton’s ‘weak’ decision to protect exposed captain

Carlton has been told to cut from the top after a damning statement leaves the club with no alternative but to wield the axe.

It’s getting ugly again at Carlton.

Former Fremantle coach Ross Lyon says Carlton should axe captain Sam Docherty to jump-start the club’s disastrous 2021 campaign.

Lyon’s damning assessment of Carlton’s work rate and the failures of senior figures in the playing group is the latest case of the Blues being exposed for failing to work hard enough to win football games.

Carlton star Zac Williams came under fire this week for a run of poor form after making the move from GWS in the off-season.

The Blues recruited Williams on a monster six-year deal during the trade period reportedly worth $800,000 a season — $4.8 million overall — but AFL pundits don’t believe he’s pulling his weight.

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Carlton has committed to undertaking a whole-of-club review after another dismal loss on the weekend put them 14th on the ladder with just four wins from 13 games. It’s grim news for Blues fans who were being told by the club this was the year they could expect to break their agonising finals drought.

Sam Docherty is leading a sinking ship.

Lyon says it is now up to coach David Teague to make the brave decision to axe Docherty to send a message to the rest of the team that their current performances will not be tolerated.

Teague recently dropped former captain Marc Murphy, but more is needed, according to Lyon.

The former St Kilda coach told Channel 9’s Footy Classified on Wednesday night letting Docherty “get away” with acts of poor effort was going to set the standard for the rest of the club.

Lyon said he’d also made “weak” decisions at the selection table by not dropping senior players when he should have.

“Make strong decisions. Get accountable. And start at the top,” Lyon said of Teague’s dilemma.

“They (Docherty and Williams) were two All Australians. We’re all seeing Docherty, and I think they had an opportunity two weeks ago because if you’re letting your captain you can get away with it, the rest of them go, ‘Beauty we’re just going to keep getting picked’.”

He said Carlton has a damning effort of only showing up for games in the third quarter before falling away in fourth quarters where they have a points differential of -62 this season.

Carlton’s defence has been under the pump this year as one of the key things holding the club back from returning to the finals.

It was exposed again in the Blues’ loss to the Bulldogs in Round 8 when Fox Footy’s On The Couch panel showed vision of Docherty failing to cover his man in the middle of the ground, having previously run off his man when the Blues had the ball in their hands.

Sam Docherty created a domino effect.

When they coughed it up, the Bulldogs were able to create another quick scoring opportunity on the rebound on the back of Docherty failing to run with his opponent into the forward 50.

The video played showed the Blues were left one man short in a domino effect that allowed Dogs forward Josh Bruce to take an uncontested mark in the forward pocket.

“This is pretty basic stuff, I would’ve thought, that you need to find stability behind the ball,” Healy said.

“You can‘t be left with an extra forward that you’re not able to grab hold of.”

The situation appears to have only got worse since with Williams also exposed for lack of effort in the Blues’ loss to GWS over the weekend.

Brisbane legend Jonathan Brown said the Giants intentionally targeted Williams and questioned his fitness levels.

Zac Williams is copping plenty of stick.

“I know they did (target Williams). I tell you what, Zac Williams is one of the laziest footballers going around at the moment,” Brown told On The Couch.

“Don’t worry, there’s about 100 pieces of vision we’ve left on the cutting room floor. We could’ve gone through it for the next half an hour and showed it. We could’ve really, really hurt his reputation. I’m just verballing it for you.

“That bloke has come to the Carlton footy club, paid that sort of money, he needs to turn up in better shape and get himself fit and turn up and put in a better effort, especially on defence.”

Williams’ workrate isn’t up to scratch according to a stack of AFL pundits.