CARLTON were outdone by a motivated North Melbourne when the two sides met at Marvel Stadium on Sunday.
Blues defender Jacob Weitering reflected the disappointment of the group when speaking on the 58-point defeat post-match.
“Disappointed – embarrassed in a sense,” said Weitering of the player’s sentiment.
“The boys are pretty flat but I guess now it’s an opportunity to learn from this.”
The Kangaroos took the momentum from the first bounce and never let it go, keeping Carlton scoreless until late in the second quarter.
Despite a strong start to the season the Blues backline struggled to hold the charging Kangaroos, conceding over a hundred points for the first time this season.
“We struggled a bit structurally and we just weren’t getting the fundamentals right and that’s pretty much the story of the game,” he said.
“Unfortunately, we had Simmo go down last week, Newy go down and then Jonesy halfway through the game as well which was hard to deal with.”
Here's what the coach had to say following today's game. #BoundByBlue
— Carlton FC (@CarltonFC) May 5, 2019
Stoic defender Liam Jones left the ground late in the third term after a sickening collision with North Melbourne’s Cameron Zurhaar.
Jones was left unconscious from the knock and had to be stretchered off the ground, but has since been cleared of any head or neck injuries.
“We’re pretty close with Jonesy,” he said of the fellow defender.
“It was hard to see him go down, but at the end of the day we’re out on the battlefield and when one man goes down everyone else has to step up.”
The Blues will need to recoup quickly after this weekend’s loss before they face a confident Collingwood side next Saturday at the MCG.
“We had a crack at the Pies early in the preseason, so we’ll have a quick look at that and the game we played today,” he said.
“We’ll just go back to what we do best, train pretty hard this week and hopefully we can come back and play a good brand of football.”