FOLLOWING an eight-point victory over Melbourne, Carlton Senior Coach Michael Voss was full of praise for his side - particularly the young players - who put together a comprehensive performance after a challenging few weeks.
Being able to complete multiple phases of their game and play more consistent footy was one pleasing aspect of the night, as well as seeing some youngsters have big moments at the MCG.
In an important night for the Club with the Carlton Respects game, Voss also lauded the exposure the cause received on the night and the money raised to continue the awareness-raising campaign.
Here's what he had to say.
On finishing out the game strongly:
"It could’ve been very easy for us to fall back into ourselves, it did feel a little bit different early in the first half.
"We had a bit more balance in our game, we weren’t necessarily relying on one particular phase to get us into the position, we had some really good defensive actions, some really sound contest moments, but then also some really good composure with the ball in hand.
"I felt like that was a lot more even, which always gives you confidence and a headspace to take care of any challenges that comes their way when they’re engaged like that.
"They certainly did ask the question, and we could’ve given up a bit there but we didn’t. I thought there was a moment in the third quarter after absorbing four or five turnovers or re-entries, we were able to absorb for four or five minutes, then go down the other end and hit the scoreboard, so that was a pretty important moment."
On the young crop playing composed football:
"The story of this for me is the younger guys being able to really play almost a trademark game. All of them were able to put their skills on show, which was fantastic to see.
"They’ve had their own points of disappointment over the last little period of time, but they’ve been working on their game in the background and O’Farrell stands tall deep, Carroll was absolutely outstanding: he was tough, went back with the flight of the ball, composed with the ball in hand, so that was great to see.
"Cowan was the same, Flynn Young, Ashton Moir, to be able to take moments for a young man and to want the ball in those moments was particularly impressive. That for me today was the absolute story."
On persisting with young players:
"It’s not about relief, it’s more about you’re proud of the work they’ve been doing.
"You’re proud of their own approach to how they’ve been doing but also the support that is around them, the coaching, the support for them to have the space to continue to develop in a really hostile environment and you’re not winning games of football – for them to stay in that positive space has been really important for us, it’s energised us.
"For some of the older guys looking at the season and going ‘gee we haven’t got what we wanted out of the year’, there are another batch of players that we’ve got that are just excited to be able to be playing and getting the opportunity to grow and be able to get better and we can’t rob them of that experience.
"What I’ve loved over the last period of time is that our leaders have been there for them and they’ve celebrated their growth, so we have to continue to do that."
On making the most of moments:
"The added one was when the push came, we were able to hold and be able to answer it as well.
"Right through the game, there was probably a heap of moments throughout the game that you could look back on and say ‘what a great moment there, what a great contest there, what a great turnover in our front half, a mark when we needed it, Charlie kicks a goal late, what a big moment, Ashton kicks a goal late, Weiters goes back with the flight of the ball.
"All those little moments that maybe we have been building towards for a little while and the players seem to be energised off the back of it."
On the Francis Evans collision:
"Clearly it’s going to be looked at, both players were in line with the ball, seemed to be attacking it, to be fair, and both making a play at the ball.
"Maybe one person was one step late, which then the incident happens, but for Frankie to hold his line with a pretty strong man coming the other way was a pretty important moment in the game.
"He wasn’t able to take his kick, Ashton finished the play, but it was a pretty important moment. I don’t tend to read too much into it at this point in time, let the tribunal take care of it, it’s up to them to educate on what they think is fair.
"We feel like we’ve been on one end of it this week with Ben Camporeale, so I’ll be interested to see how they look at that."
On Francis Evan's condition:
"I spoke to him on the way out, he seems quite ok. He’s disappointed because he was playing a fantastic game of footy, he was doing an unbelievable role for us and lost a pretty important player.
"Speaking to him out there, other than being a little banged up on the nose, he was actually pretty good."
On Charlie Curnow and the fellow leaders:
"His game has been pretty consistent for a little while, he just hasn’t hit the scoreboard.
"I’ve been encouraged by what he’s been trying to do for the last month in particular and he hasn’t been getting his own way and I’m sure that he’s been frustrated that he hasn’t been able to hit the scoreboard, but he’s kept turning up.
"It wasn’t just Charlie, 'Weiters' was fantastic and I think 'Crippa' over this little period of time has been leading really well.
"For Charlie to get the reward and finish the way he did, when you look at him, he looked like he wanted to take that moment, and it was pleasing to see he did and close out the game for us."
On Jacob Weitering's versatility and backline cohesion:
"He’s a big man, so to get past him is a bit of a challenge. You want to be able to build a defence that can play tall/small, take their turn when they need to, that seems to be what modern defences are all about, play a bit more with where the relevance is with the ball and where your strengths lie.
"We feel like our strengths are there, but at the same time, we’d like him further up the ground doing his best, which is generating and interupting the opposition’s passages of play.
"We’re building that back six or seven, to see Ollie Hollands, Lachie Cowan, Matty Carroll, Harry O’Farrell, they’re all young men that are forging their way very young in how many games they’ve played and they’re forging a cohesion and a relationship there.
"It’s not going to be perfect, they’re going to have some bad moments, but they’re working their way forward, which is pleasing to see."
On utilising kicking more:
"Sometimes you play what you get given to you. I thought we were far more composed with the ball in hand tonight, so we tended to pick our speed a bit better than what we have in the past, rather than being all fast or all slow, we were able to find better moments where we went from inside to out.
"We played against two really good teams the last two weeks, so there were challenges on a lot of fronts, but I saw a lot of progress in our game toinght and namely, the focus we had on defending well as a team and it got us in better positions around the ground, now it’s all up to opportunity: can you convert or not? And we did a better job of that tonight.
"That’s all about the system and how the system operates around it, how high an opposition defence gets, so obviously they got really high early because they were defending in their half and running at us a bit.
"Our backs had to manage the depth of that and the space - I don’t think we quite got that right early - but once we started to get a read on the game, we did that better.
On Tom De Koning's shoulder:
"He described it as a stinger to me, so I can only assume that’s what it was."
On containing Kysaiah Pickett:
"He’s a pretty good player, especially in the forward line; he's got some tricks. If there’s a growth out of the game, it’s probably we didn’t manage him as well as what we wanted to.
"Once we corrected it, that’s when we started to get in the game. Any time he was under control, we were able to get the game going our way, but he was a pretty important player in the state of the game.
"He was doing damage everywhere, whether he started on ball and went forward, we didn’t really handle that as well as we should’ve so we went to work on that and the boys were able to correct that.
On Carlton Respects:
"Tonight is a very important night for us as a football club, we have our Carlton Respects game, we’ve been doing it for close to a decade now.
"I sat here last year and thanked the media for being able to provide a platform for us and the exposure for us to be able to raise money and raise awareness and get our ‘Road to Respects’ program right throughout schools.
"It’s a really important program to us; we had some unbelievable stories that were shared over the last few days. We had the Unwin family coming in and sharing their harrowing story about losing their sister, their daughter.
"To be able to create some awareness around that and challenge the behaviour of men and how we treat women is extremely important to us, and the violence towards them.
"The activation tonight, I’m really proud of our football club, we want to win football games but we also want to make the community proud and our Club was on show tonight and I thought they did an amazing job but also to all of you to provide that exposure so we can get that message out there.
"We really appreciate it, so thank you once again."
