TESTS don’t go much bigger in AFL football these days.
When Carlton heads to north to open its 2024 season on Friday night, the Blues will attempt something which no team has done since 2022 — beat the Brisbane Lions at the Gabba.
Plenty have comparisons have been made to last year’s preliminary final, with the Blues to start their 2024 season where their 2023 run ended.
On that day, Carlton had Brisbane’s measure early, shellshocking the hosts and surging out to a five-goal lead. However, as good teams do, the Lions recovered and rallied, ultimately coming away with a 16-point win.
The Blues can take heart from what they were able to do early in that game. For want of a better term, the blueprint was very much there on how to take the game to the Lions.
And they’re the two words which Michael Voss favours more than any other, and you just know it’s going to be what the AFL Senior Coach drills home to his players pre-game on Friday night.
Pressure and contest.
The Lions and Blues play a similar game in terms of their appetite for winning contested ball. Two of the stronger teams in the metric across the competition last year, the Blues will be out to hunt the Lions in packs and win first possession on the short Gabba deck.
Forward territory is crucial: in the first quarter of last year’s preliminary final, the Blues were +10 in inside-50 differential, famously kicking the first five goals of the game as a result.
The Blues’ on-ball brigade will need to be at their brutal best against the Lions, with Brisbane shading Carlton in clearance numbers throughout 2023 (42.2 versus 39.3). With the last two Brownlow Medallists - and two Ball Magnets at that - taking centre stage, it’s no surprise that both teams will have a keen eye on what happens at the centre bounce.
Expect Patrick Cripps to once again go head-to-head with Brisbane’s Josh Dunkley, while the threat of Lachie Neale is something the Blues won’t need to be reminded of. Could George Hewett get the role on the reigning competition best-and-fairest?
One role which is set in stone is that of Zac Williams, who will play his first game in over 18 months in a long-awaited return from an ACL injury.
Priced at just $442,000 in AFL Fantasy, Williams is well and truly one to watch, not only for his price hike in the coming weeks from a Fantasy perspective, but also by sheer virtue of the fact that footy is a better place when Carlton’s No.6 is doing what he does best.
