I'm with you Paf, It's not personal we just want to move on with people who are going to make it.

Fisher is not our worst but his kicking is more than just down on confidence. He has always missed easy shots at goal. When do we think he will stop missing them? I personally think he wont, not with his kicking action. I'm sure he's out there practicing now, but he's simply not up to standard for a top 6 AFL team. And that's what we wont to be surely.

Russell is the same. Good endevour will not win us #17!

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I support the Navy Blues whatever happens!

You want someone to blame for our lack of depth then go and see Mr Boofhead "We don't rebuild at Carlton" Elliot.
Countless draft pick traded for hacks and now the only consistently good players in the 26-29 bracket are Fev, Scotland, Houlihan and Stevens.
This group of players are the ones that win finals with some brilliant youngsters thrown in, so until Gibbs, Walks, Murph, Grigg, Bower, Russell and Kreuzer reach that level of maturity we aren't going too far.
We don't have any depth because we didn't plan for it, it's that simple.

We need to get rid of some o the guys that we know aren't going to make the grade , and take advantage of what is supposed a sh1t-hot draft . Give ourselves at least 6 picks in the 2008 draft and 1 in the PSD . Trade week might see a pick or 2 traded , but if we pick up the right players for those picks , all the better . This year is the time for a clean out of the list , and a freshen up with new blood . With new teams coming in , this will be the last chance for a while .

Let me say up front a couple of positive things up front before i get to the negatives:-


Well done to Gibbs, Fev, Judd, Simpson and others for their strong effort on the weekend.


Let me also that I admire ALL people who make it to AFL level - it takes great perseverance and strength of character.......however,



I can no longer watch Carlton matches this year whilst knowing (Even blind freddy knows) that our C grade players (Russell, Wiggins and others)
are not even considered for being dropped. They are the untouchables.



B+ players such as Stevens should be allowed to have the odd off day. We accept that they will come back stronger the next week. Stevens has played some outstanding matches for the Blues and that should be acknowledged.



But C grade players that have consistently bad games week after week after week should be allowed to go to the reserves to get form. Until I see C grade players being given a holiday I am not putting myself through the emotional turmoil of watching Carlton matches.


I like what I have seen of Armfield, Pfeiffer, Browne and others, but what is the point of seeing those players rotting away in the reserves?

Armfield's not in the reserves, he's injured.
Browne looks OK but it's his first season and he's still very light and physically immature.
Pfeiffer hasn't overly impressed.
The players in the seniors are our current best 22 with Hadley, Houlihan, Bower and Armfield injured, so try and suck it up and support the team.

Armfield's not in the reserves, he's injured.
Browne looks OK but it's his first season and he's still very light and physically immature.
Pfeiffer hasn't overly impressed.
The players in the seniors are our current best 22 with Hadley, Houlihan, Bower and Armfield injured, so try and suck it up and support the team.[/quote]

Pfeiffer hasn't overly impressed?...Do you think Russell, Wiggins & Fisher have overly impressed or impressed at all in JR's case?

At Least Pfeiffer & Brown give 100% at contests, are hungry for their spot in the team, put their body on the line & will be part of our future.

Pfeiffer in...JR out.

Neither Pfeiffer or Browne are going to be considered as a half forward, so your comparison to Fisher, Wiggins and Russell is irrelevant.
Pfeiffer would be looking at either Grigg or Bentick's spot, Browne either Carrazzo or Scotland.
Either way would be OK by me, but I don't pick the team.

I can't believe people are still blaming Elliott for our player depth issues.

You are right, David Parkin should share equal culpability for the fiasco during the mid to late 90s where we traded early draft picks for duds like McGuane, O'Reilly, Mansfield et al - players from the picks we lost here would now be 10+ seasoned veterans of our list and core players. Elliott took Parkin's counsel on all these matters.


And Pagan has equal culpability for the fiasco of 2003 and 2004 drafts where he went for recycled players - of whom only Jordan Bannister remains.

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"Hence you will not say that Greeks fight like heroes but that heroes fight like Greeks"?

Winston Churchill

I agree, Parkin has escaped alot of the blame. Another recycled player you forgot is Scotland, a handy pick up.

Why not, FFS?
Boofhead stated categorically that Carlton was about winning premierships and didn't rebuild, what more evidence do you want?
In a nutshell, Geelong used the pick we gave them for Mansfield to draft Paul Chapman.

Pagan had no choice.
He inherited a shocking list and lost two first round and two second round draft picks, two of which were top two picks.
Those four players would now be around 100 games and be of enormous value to the team.
Everything Elliott touched turned to shit, including the CFC.

I think you're being a bit tough on Wiggo, Norm. He gives his 100% every week and was almost single handedly responsible for our winning two games recently from his last quarter heroics. OK he'll never be Chris Judd but he doesn't have to be.

I think we forget too quickly that our best teams have had players who weren't superstars and who were probably lucky to win premierships.
McConville, Mil, Hopkins and many others who were week in and week out being played off the bench and or being dropped to the reserves. In that era of no footy forums they would no doubt have been the scapegoats like Wiggo, Russell and some others regularly mentioned on these pages. Mil, for example was a shocking kick. His passes had far too much hangtime. He was, by the way one of my personal favourites before people get started.
A team will always have its mix of a few superstars, a lot of steady players and a few fringe dwellers just starting out or just finishing up. The secret of success has always been knowing the right time to let the kids replace the more experienced players but that is usually when they are ready. It is all very well to call for the fringe dwellers to be dropped but that means usually replacing them with more fringe dwellers.
If we are to play finals in any given year, next year for example, we have to win about 12 games it would seem. If we play the kids who aren't as good as the current players, we may not get to the required 12 games at all. Let the course of development take its path and we will find the Russells, Wiggins and co will fall by the wayside when their replacements are good and ready.

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Let slip the Blues of war (with apologies to William Shakespeare) (and Sir Francis Bacon, just in case)

I think we now have a good platform of depth to build on in the coming years.

We still have Houlihan, Bower & Hadley to walk into our straing 22 & others like Armfield, Browne & O'hailpin who are semi-regulars in our starting 22, along with kids like Pfeiffer, Edwards, Anderson, Hampson, Jackson pushing for senior selection.

Another couple of newbies from the draft or a trade & we're starting to look pretty good.

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The Future is Bright, the Future is Navy Blue.

Had no choice - you answered your own question "those four players would now be around 100 games and be of enormous value to the team" instead Pagan went the "Ninthmond" route and loaded up with hacks (apologies to the likes of Bowyer, Harford etc who were all great blokes) and we finished a creditable 10th in 2004 and had pick 9 and 25 in our first draft back in the system when we should have been having a go at Franklin, Roughead, Deledio et al.

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"Hence you will not say that Greeks fight like heroes but that heroes fight like Greeks"?

Winston Churchill

St Kilda picked Barry Hall with the pick we traded for CRAIG flower DEVONPORT

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Richard Pratt - A Carlton legend.

I don't follow you.
Are you saying that we should have deliberately lost games in 2004 and collected another spoon?
From memory I think we delisted 15 or 16 players at the end of 2003 of which only Simon Fletcher managed to get a game somewhere else, and that was only a handful of games at Richmond.
Surely this suggests that our playing list at the time was woeful.
Pagan did a very good job with what he had to finish where we did in 2004.
As I've said elsewhere the biggest problem we have at the moment is our lack of quality experienced players in their mid to late 20's, and that can be traced directly back to Elliott's incompetence.