This Saturday evening’s AFLW match between Carlton and Brisbane at IKON Park coincides with a landmark moment in this football club’s history – the 1000th senior match involving a Carlton team at the Club’s home.
The impending match with the Lions doubles as Carlton’s 38th AFLW match since 2017; the Club having previously fielded men’s senior teams in 962 VFL/AFL matches across 109 seasons there from 1897-2005.
In casting a nostalgic eye across Carlton’s 117-year occupancy, the following 10 matches have been cherry-picked from the previous 999 as the most significant involving Carlton teams (bearing in mind the subjective nature of the exercise).
VFL Grand Final v South Melbourne (record Princes Park attendance 62,986) - Saturday 29 September, 1945
Almost 80 years after it was staged, the 1945 Grand Final won by Carlton lives in infamy alone as one of the most violent contests ever seen on the Australian mainland. Ironically staged in the year of peace and victory before an unparalleled audience at the venue, ‘The Bloodbath’ saw nine players reported and suspensions totalling 68 matches, as the Blues, led by their fearsome captain Bob Chitty, secured the Club’s seventh premiership pennant. A returned serviceman watching from the terraces perhaps put it best when he said of the 1945 Grand Final: “I thought I was at the wrong bloody war”.
First Carlton VFL home match, v Collingwood - Round 7, Tuesday 22 June, 1897
On a momentous occasion at the Carlton ground, the arch foes battled it out in a somewhat anti-climactic low-scoring affair - with the black and whites prevailing by a straight kick and Wally Ocock consigned to the history books as the first Carlton footballer to boot a goal on the hallowed turf. Earlier, a correspondent for The Argus newspaper reported: “As the teams lined up preparatory to the start, Mr A. H. Shaw, President of the Carlton Club, called for three cheers for the Queen, and he then asked Alderman Moloney to have the first kick on the new ground, which was, of course, an old-fashioned Irish punt”.
First Carlton AFLW match (and victory), v Collingwood - Round 1, Friday 3 February, 2017
On an historic night for the League and two of its greatest entities, Carlton met Collingwood in an historic blockbuster to launch women’s football at the pre-eminent level.
A total of 24,568 crammed into the Royal Parade venue to see Lauren Arnell captained the home team to a meritorious 35-point win. Carlton marquees Darcy Vescio contributed four goals (including the Blues’ famous first) to the final scoreline and the footy seemed to follow Brianna Davey.
First Carlton VFL victory, v St Kilda - Round 13, Saturday 31 July, 1897
Jimmy Aitken, as Carlton captain, led the way at the old home ground, booting the only three goals of his career in the team’s 33-point victory over its bottom-placed rival. Jim Goonan made history as the first Carlton player to win on debut at the ground, and his son Jimmy would later represent the Blues through the 1920s to complete the Club’s first father/son combination before the rule was even thought of.
Last VFL/AFL match, v Melbourne - Round 9, Saturday 21 May, 2005
Carlton’s 962nd and final match ended as it had begun in the first, with a forgettable loss – this time to the Neale Daniher-coached Redlegs. What is remembered, however, is the beautiful post-game moment when the then Carlton captain Anthony Koutoufides handed the match-day football to the great John Nicholls, who in raising the pill brought down the curtain on 109 winters at the Club’s home.
Club record 30.30 (210) scoreline, v Hawthorn - Round 2, Saturday 12 April, 1969
Carlton’s first home match of the 1969 season was marked by the pre-game unfurling of its drought-breaking 1968 premiership pennant – and it only got better from there.
The Blues completed a systematic plucking of Hawk fathers, piling on a mammoth record scoreline (which still stands at the Club) of 30.30 (210) – which included a 12.6 final term - to complete the 128-point rout.
Peter ‘Percy’ Jones contributed seven goals of his own to the final scoreline, with Alex Jesaulenko posting a scarcely believable 6.12 and Wes Lofts later copping a four-match suspension for biffing Hawthorn full-forward Peter Hudson.
The Last Suburban Battle, v Collingwood - Round 18, Sunday 9 July, 2000
The spruikers did their best to talk it up pre-match, but The Last Suburban Battle with Collingwood fast became The Last Suburban Slaughter - the home team booting a record score and posting its greatest winning margin over the hapless black and whites, 28.12 (180) to 10.9 (69).
Prominent in the goalkicking spree was Lance Whitnall with five goals – gloriously aided and abetted by the former Collingwood player Trent Hotton putting five of his own over the goal umpire’s hat.
Greg Kennedy’s record haul, v Hawthorn - Round 21, Saturday, August 26, 1972
It almost beggars belief that the Eaglehawk recruit Greg Kennedy was chasing the leather in his maiden season for the Blues when he booted 12.3 – the most goals ever kicked by a Carlton player at the venue – in the penultimate round of the ’72 home and aways.
Kennedy’s record haul at the Carlton ground forever remains so – although the great Horrie Clover went one better at the Junction Oval with 13 from centre half-forward against St Kilda back in 1921.
Craig Bradley’s running goal v West Coast – Round 22, Sunday, August 21, 1994
Why Craig Bradley didn’t earn Goal of the Year in 1994 remains as much of a mystery as Andrew Walker’s inability to get the gong for THAT mark over Jake Carlisle at ‘The G’ in 2011. “Old timers” on hand to witness ‘Braddles’’ moment of greatness (one of many it should be said) will tell you this was the greatest goal ever kicked by a Carlton player on the hallowed home turf.
It happened in a frenetic moment of the team’s hotly contested match with West Coast. Bradley had somehow managed to thwart Peter Matera’s marking attempt on the city side wing, then followed up with a one-handed gather to edge around Guy McKenna. A subsequent give and get to Andrew McKay saw the rampant Bradley break clear with another bounce, and from just inside 50 slot a banana goal despite the best efforts of the lunging Glen Jakovich.
For any self-respecting Carlton type, this was truly an “I was there the day” moment.
Malcolm Blight’s ball-burster, Princes Park – Round 10, Saturday, June 5, 1976
It’s a moment that’s been rather annoyingly replayed ad nauseum for the past five decades – Malcolm Blight’s ridiculous post-siren, post-high torpedo to sink the Blues by five points on their home deck.
It’s also a moment remembered by Princes Park patrons with as much annoyance as the Round 20 match with Essendon five years later when Neale Daniher and field umpire Ian Robinson were the villains of the piece . . . and the Blues somehow blew a 28-point time-on lead.
