There is no doubting the excitement that is building for the 2009 season at Carlton with an estimated crowd of 10,000 attending the Hyundai Blues Family Day at Visy Park on Sunday. Sure the weather was ideal adding to the attraction of the day but there is no doubting the feeling of expectation among Carlton supporters.

And supporters were certainly not disappointed with a hugely successful day of activities and meeting with the players. The highlight being the presentation of guernseys to the playing group by coach Brett Ratten, closely followed by the launch of Carlton’s Rock Anthem for 2009, “They Know We’re Coming” by Jack Howard. While many supporters have already downloaded the song, it was that popular on the day that if there was a CD available, it may have gone straight to number one on the charts, if that was possible.

Of course it is the involvement of the players that the supporters enjoy most of all. On Sunday the players were involved with the various activities around the ground and in particular with the sponsor activities that proved very popular.

The Tourism Malaysia marquee with information on Malaysia and of course the chance to sample Malaysian satays, together with the Tourism Malaysia gift and Malaysia carry bag.

Malaysia Marquee

The Hyundai marquee with the free Hyundai showbag, including a big lolly pop, Hyundai player masks and the Hyundai Hot Shots where supporters were able to star in their own Carlton photograph alongside their favourite Carlton player. Plus of the course the Hyundai Zurf races throughout the day.

The Visy marquee was also very popular, as were the Visy Park cardboard stools and give-aways and environmental tips from Carlton’s environmental ambassadors.

Other popular marquees included the TeleChoice marquee with one lucky supporter winning football signed by Chris Judd and of course the Grinders Coffee marquee as well as the free footballs given away at the Origin marquee.

It was not all about give-aways and meeting the players, it was also about raising funds for the Victorian Bushfire Appeal. Donations were received from supporters and proceeds from the Family Day raffle were collected for the Bushfire Appeal. Adding to this fundraising was the wonderful gesture by Club Patron Richard Pratt, through Visy and the Pratt Foundation, to match the funds raised, dollar for dollar. Thus making doubling the money raised for the appeal from the Family Day.

Adding to the excitement around the 2009 season was Brett Ratten confirming that nothing less than a top eight finish was acceptable for Carlton in 2009.

“We’ve had patches through our club’s history that we’ve been down, but never for this long and there’s an onus on the group, myself included, to deliver,” he told the 10,000 strong crowd.

“Every year you try and raise the bar and this is no exception… we need to stand up a bit, it’s been a long time for this club to be down.”

Ratten admitted that he was happy to add expectation to a maturing playing group.

“That will put us under enormous pressure at some stages this year, but you set a standard… Our expectation is to play finals football every year.”

On Friday night at The Dome Carlton will play its first NAB Cup match of 2009 and Chris Judd and Brendan Fevola are both expected to play against North Melbourne.

Some of the activities at Family Day