View from the Outer
Let’s be honest, the result was not what we were looking for. After such a positive off-season the script didn’t go to plan. In reality the script was thrown out the window a week before the season opener. Hindsight is a wonderful thing.

The last week prior to the first game started with a tv show beat-up by a reporter more interested in himself than a misguided story and then one of our own had a misadventure that gave the impression he forgot how much work had been done, how close the season was and that the individual is a small part of the overall team – the team comes first.

But we can’t look for these issues as excuses it is a matter of the excitement, in some cases bordering on hysteria, which had built up since November and was always going to be impossible to live up to. Reality was going to hit sooner or later and for the supporters it certainly came earlier than we had expected (certainly earlier than we had wanted). Unfortunately it wasn’t meant to be on Thursday night when we did battle with last year’s wooden spoon ‘winners’. It did and now we must look forward not back.

Sure the Blues lost but there were many positives to be taken from the performance, none more so than the manner in which the team went about the first half of the game. A little more luck and we may well have had the game in our keeping by the first half but it wasn’t to be.

While the coach was rightfully disappointed with Richmond winning so many more of the ‘hard ball gets’ perhaps that is a clue as to why Carlton should remain positive. Let’s be honest in the last couple of seasons most of our victories have been due to Carlton being ‘harder at it’ than the opposition in a given match. On Thursday night we saw Carlton show patches of class, and this will continue to build and we will be winning matches on class. Add the hardness, that will return, and the combination will see the improvement we are all looking for.

Of course the other real positive was the form of Nick Stevens and Chris Judd. Stevens, playing his first match since round three last year, was in great form and was always going to struggle to run out the match after missing a couple of weeks of late pre-season training. And Judd was playing only his second game since last year’s finals after post-season groin surgery. He is sure to improve further in the next few weeks as he works his way back into the form that has made him the premier player of the competition.

Ironically it was injuries to two of our young players that really upset Carlton’s line-up going into the game. Hampson who has played just two games and Kreuzer who is yet to play an AFL match were both out injured and their presence would certainly have been a huge boost to the team on Thursday night. Hampson has been our number one ruckman in the pre-season and Kreuzer has shown he is ready to step up to AFL level as a key forward and relief ruckman. With Brad Fisher also missing, it was always going to be difficult with a ruckman, a key-forward/ruckman and a key forward out of the line-up.

Hindsight is a wonderful thing but it provides answers and in this case real positives for what we are still looking forward to. There were some great signs and there is no doubt the Blues will get better. Perhaps it really is a matter of the build up to the season was too big to live up to and now that it is over we (and that means everyone at Carlton – players, coaches, staff, members and supporters) can now get down to business for the 2008 season.

Here’s hoping hindsight will tell us that the round one loss was not a problem in the long run but that is not easy to think about at this time. A loss is always disappointing but it should not stop the Carlton faithful joining to ensure we have a record membership, indeed 40,000 plus in 2008.

It is too early to see how far we’ve come, let’s enjoy the excitement of a team on the rise and around mid-year we can review the progress and be in a position to “Let’s see how far we’ve come”.