Was Mitch Robinson’s mode of dress for this morning’s training session at Visy Park a throwback to the knickerbocker days of old Carlton town, when former captains Tommy Leydin and Bill Strickland took to the field in dark Navy top to toe?

Compare Mitch’s strip with those sported by Leydin and Strickland through the 1880s, and it’s hard to argue that the former hasn’t gone back to the future with his choice of gear.

Strickland, the wingman who joined Carlton from neighbouring Brunswick, was a member of the team led by Leydin to the 1887 VFA Premiership. Leydin, recruited from The Avenue two years previous, earned a handsome reputation as a centre half-back and was ahead of his time in more than just his dress sense.

When the Carlton team hit a form slump in July 1888 – 125 years ago this month – ol’ Tommy went on the record to remind his cohorts of “The five P Principle” – proper planning prevents poor performance.

“Training is absolutely essential to a good footballer. Without it he does not keep his eyes about him-he gets tired, and, in fact does not care whether he plays well or badly,” Leydin said.

“If the other side gets hold of the ball he makes no effort to take it back, and generally plays in a dull and listless fashion that makes you sick, whereas if a man looks after himself and keeps himself always up to a fair pitch, he never tires, and in every department of the game he is better. He runs quicker, marks with more certainty, dodges more surely, and plays in the last quarter with the same life and spirit that he did in the first. 

“Men who do not train will not play, and from now no team will represent us that is not in the very best form and thoroughly fit in every particular. Each man knows that if he wishes to keep his place in the club, he will have to work for it, and if there be any who fancy they are good enough without, well, they will find that the committee hold different ideas.”