Sure.

In large part, I think every traditional Victorian club (merely by the weight of their history) is going to be a little more weighed down (or at least influenced) by their past. So in some way, the organisation can't help but be defined by what's gone before. Same for Richmond and Collingwood and Essendon* too, it's not just us. So when a guy like Roos comes in, he's part of a chain that stretches back a long, long way. And he'd know it too.

You know - you take the coaching role at Collingwood, and on Day 1 some 90 year old is going to bale you up about Jock McHale. And at Richmond, it'll be Tommy Hafey and the 1960's and all that stuff.

But a club like West Coast, or Adelaide, or the Sydney Swans (forget the fact they used to be SMFC, they were a brand new entity up in the harbour city) doesn't really have the past. Not so many old ex players, or old deeds. Only the hope for what's to come. Any history they have is modern history.

So there's that (which is all very wanky new-age stuff. But I reckon that's what Roosy is into.

Then there's the feeling I get that Carlton still has a way to go in regards to embracing the new era it finds itself in. We seem like a club that isn't all that comfortable embracing change. After the shock of our first wooden spoons and the culture-shock of Pagan, it appears as if we deliberately decided to return to our roots for a while... to follow more comfortable old patterns and behaviours.

The Patriarch in Pratty. The Gun Signing in Juddy. The coach who barracked in the box. Very navy blue, very Carlton. Maybe not so very appealing to an individual like Roos.

I'm not saying that what we're doing is wrong - I'm a great believer in embracing your history (but more importantly, learning from it) and not denying who you are and what makes you strong. But just putting forward why I think that a guy like Roos wouldn't necessarily see Carlton as 'his' kind of club.

I also get the feeling that he doesn't think too highly of us, from his pressers. You can sometimes sense grudging admiration or respect from opposition coaches... but from Roos, I sense a degree of animosity. I genuinely don't think he likes our club all that much. Again, it's the Denuto Defense.

I also get the feeling that he doesn't think too highly of us, from his pressers. You can sometimes sense grudging admiration or respect from opposition coaches... but from Roos, I sense a degree of animosity. I genuinely don't think he likes our club all that much. Again, it's the Denuto Defense.

I'm sick of Ratts going out of his way to say abso !@#$%& lutely nothing. I can't remember the last time he said something interesting.

Agreed that any decision must be deferred until the end of this year....

however, in order to make an informed decision at that time I will be watching the following things closely over the remainder of the season:

1. whether we develop a game plan (ie. a structured and efficient way of moving the ball from defence to attack)?

2. how our mature age recruits (who presumably were selected by the match committee) such as mclean, warnock, hadley, johnson etc continue to develop and contribute to the team ?

3. how we structure our forward line to generate winning scores ?

4. how we set up our midfield to maximise our strengths (eg. how do we free up judd/murphy, use gibbs, lock down opposition etc)

5. how we develop our younger generation (eg. bower, hampson, grigg, lucas, robinson, yarran etc) ?

These are the areas where I will be focussing to be able to assess how our football committee (headed by our senior coach) are tracking ....

And our whole football committee should be held to high standards because as our great ex-President (RIP) demanded ...Carlton deserve the best in every area...which means we should not merely settle for the best available !!!

So at year end, the hard question that demands to be asked is:

Based on all the evidence, are Messrs Ratten, Riley, Montgomery, Lappin, Harvey et al the VERY BEST going around ?

and this here is a beautiful example of the delusional nature of the football expert in 2010. It has elegantly captured the idea that some unknown banging away on keys may actually have an idea, may actually be able to understand what is happening at the club, can assess things clearly, intelligently and without bias, has all the facts and none of the gossip, but most importantly that it even matters.



It is a delightful post and I congratulate livolover for this quaint expose on the modern football critic/supporter.

In fact it even captures the thing about the Internet

that being that in the old days opinions held and expressed were just minute fluctuations on a breeze

now they fall to the ground, heavy in their own self-importance, not to wither and curl like leaves, sadly, but to lay around and clutter up all manner of things

like plastic

a plague on all our petro-chemical posts!

At least it clears there air. There is absolutely no doubt now as to what needs to be done.