ONE STEP at a time. 

Michael Voss is aware of the tough road home that the Blues have in front of them, but he isn’t going to change tact at Round 21 given taking things one week at a time has been his motto since Round 1. 

Not looking beyond the Brisbane clash this Sunday, the AFL Senior Coach wants to make sure that Carlton can put its best foot forward and start the game with the behaviours the team values.

“We haven’t changed that narrative for the entire year, so I’m not sure why we would change that now,” Voss said. 

“Repeat behaviours is something we’ve got to emphasise and keep training and keep rewarding, but obviously the focus goes firmly on Brisbane. 

“We just want to start with the things we value and get that right, that’ll put ourselves in with a very good shot.” 

The general consensus to come out of last week’s review was that the Blues lacked intent and pressure, with Voss admitting it’s an area that needs to be rectified immediately.

Noting the performance was an outlier in terms of pressure - an area the Blues are usually very strong in - Voss hopes that it won’t become a common thread in Carlton’s game. 

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“Clearly the intent of our group was off last week in that particular phase of the game,” he said. 

“We need to go to work on it, we need to own it – most of the review was about that. That’s one area we need to address quite urgently: not much works when you don’t bring that intensity for the contest. 

“You can focus on one game or you can look at how we’ve been over the course of the whole year, and there's been an appetite for this group to get their hands dirty. So we have to correct ourselves a little bit in that area and make sure we bring that intent when we go to Brisbane.” 

With only three games remaining in the home-and-away season, Voss said that nothing was going to change with their approach moving forward, although with an added luxury of being able to change up personnel.

Voss notes that being able to try out different structures and strategies will help them assess the best method to move forward, having to take stock of what works and what doesn’t. 

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“Maybe the emphasis goes back a little bit to the fundamentals and the really simple things in your game and making sure that they’re really strong but there’s not going to be any reinventing ball movement or the way they defend at this time of the year,” he said. 

“We’ve had a lot of different structures this year, a lot of different looks…there’s going to be parts we like about that and some parts we don’t like.

“We’ll keep focusing on the little things and just make sure we get it right.”

Having quite the history at the famous Gabba, Voss said he wouldn’t let any of those emotions take his focus this weekend, only having eyes for the Navy Blue performance. 

“It’s been a really long time,” he said. 

“Your emotional energy all goes into what we’re doing here. Clearly the game is important to us, we look at the stage of the year that it’s in and where we want to be and it’s an important game.” 

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