Pre-season has come to a close – what's your summation of what’s been a very busy period? 

I leave the period pleased. The coaches have done a great job in gelling together, and we’re happy with the two games from a playing perspective. I leave the period pleased with where we’ve got to.

For yourself, four months or so at IKON Park, how have you found it?

I knew coming in that the first pre-season would be a challenge in trying to get the group together as much as we possibly could. I think we’ve done that pretty well. I’m really enjoying it so far, the Club has been very welcoming and the people have been open to my suggestions. I’m pleased.

We saw the Geelong practice match on Wednesday night right here at IKON Park... what were the biggest takeaways?

We moved the ball reasonably well and the group was reasonably happy with the way we defended, particularly in the first half where Geelong battled to get through us. Seeing the connection of the group, enjoying each other’s company and successes and implementing some other things the coaches wanted from a scenario point of view.

Safe to say it’s been a busy but really positive week for Carlton. Let’s start off with Sam Walsh re-signing, what did that mean to the football club? 

Some contract announcements are bigger than the person receiving it. When signing for that amount of time, it means something more than just their own scenario. It was a great reflection of where the group had come from in pre-season. Sam has said publicly he never wanted to leave and as I understand it, he didn’t engage with anyone else. It was purely ‘I want to be at Carlton’. That’s a massive message for our supporters as well.

Some commentary around the nature of the deal, he’s one of three players in the competition now that’s signed until 2034 – what's your stance on it? 

He’s the third player now, but he won’t end up being that! Keeping Sam at our Club, he’s already a leader that has significant influence amongst the group. It was just an important signing to get. I understand the length of deal in these situations is what is scrutinised, but we’re really comfortable that Sam will be a great player for us for a long period of time.

It continued what was 48 hours of good news for the Club, with Elijah Hollands and Wade Derksen rewarded with SSP spots – can you talk us through that dual decision? 

We had the potential for the spot with Motlop’s unfortunate injury. We were waiting to see how Wade completed the couple of weeks of pre-season he was with us. From a depth perspective, we felt we needed key position depth. He did enough in the Brisbane game and certainly well again against Geelong to suggest he was a good player to add to our list.

With Elijah, we all know his talent. It was about making sure he was putting the building blocks in place to make sure he wasn’t a good player just in pre-season, but how he turns up for the remainder of the year.

All up there’s been nine list changes from the end of last season, how are you seeing not only its makeup but also the general feeling around the group? 

The guys have done such a good job to connect through this pre-season. Will Hayward, Ollie Florent, Ben Ainsworth have added significant amounts to our group from a cultural perspective. The guys from Sydney are absolute extroverts that are bringing real energy to the group, and Benny Ainsworth, we’ve seen how good a player he can be when he’s let off the leash. We’re really pleased with what they’ve brought on. It was fantastic to see Campbell Chesser perform against Geelong  and Liam Reidy has added competition from a ruck perspective as well.

Has there been any player or players that have surprised you during your time at the Club? 

We were pleased again to see Cooper Lord who did a fantastic job around the midfield, seeing Zac Williams go behind the ball and set us up from a ball movement perspective has been good as well.

When it comes to Opening Round, has there been any discussion around potentially how many new players could be too many in the one game? 

They’ll just be selected. I imagine you’ll see a fair number, we’re contemplating in the next week how we’re going to do the guernsey presentations in the lead-up, because there is going to be a heap of them.

Will we see Jacob Weitering in Opening Round? 

I think so. There’s nothing right now to suggest he’s not going to be there. He’ll have to manage the pain aspect, but people keep telling me he’s a bit like Wolverine who recovers pretty well. I’m sure he’ll want to be out there.

One thing that hasn’t been announced as yet is the Club’s 2026 leadership group: what does that process look like and when can we expect an announcement? 

That’ll come over the next week. We’ve done the voting, it’s now a matter of making sure the players hear first. I imagine over the weekend, we’ll have something.

Travis Boak has also recently joined the football Club, how have you found his appointment and what has the feedback been so far? 

Travis has done a great job in putting together the questions we ask the players in order for them to actually vote on the leadership group. We’re rapt with his contribution in that. Travis has brought everything that Michael and I thought he would. A great mentor for the young players in the way they prepare themselves, and I’m sure that if you ask Patrick [Cripps] and Sam [Walsh] and Jacob [Weitering], he’s been a great foil for them from a leadership perspective.

The Club welcomed Harry Dean and Jack Ison last year, have Cody Walker on the radar this year and have recently celebrated a new NGA zone – it’s a really promising time for the Carlton Academy. 

We’re rapt with what Harry has done in the couple of games that he’s played. Jack took a nice mark and was really engaged from a pressure perspective in the VFL game today, he uses the ball really well. We saw something out of him on Wednesday. Cody, we’ll talk a lot more about him in the year to come, but he’ll certainly add something to our group when he’s on our AFL list.

There has been changes to the list management team with the departure of Mick Agresta, what decisions have been made about what that will look like moving forward? 

We’re still working through what the structure needs to look like for 2026 and beyond. Once we’ve made some decisions on that between myself, Nick [Austin] and Graham [Wright], we’ll make people aware. Right now, there haven’t been further steps in that regard.

What are some changes or adjustments you’ve made within the football department that perhaps people would see on the surface that you’d be able to shed some light on? 

When you’re bringing in so many new coaches, the reality is the environment changes. That’s been the biggest aspect right now, having an entirely new development team. We should focus a little bit on them. When you add Josh Fraser and Leigh Adams, two guys who have certainly added to the fun in the place, they’ve been great additions from an AFL perspective.

When you start thinking about Damian Truslove, our VFL coach coming from Sydney and GWS, Ash Close coming in previously being from Collingwood, Jacob Townsend adding something that’s been fantastic - those guys have done a great job from a development standpoint. The reality is, they’re going to need to continue to do a good job, because we need the bottom end of our list to improve and improve quickly if we’re going to get to where we want to get to.

One of those changes has been the amount of open training sessions that have taken place at IKON Park. It’s your first year in the role but you’ve been a Carlton supporter since way back - what has it meant to you to see so many Carlton people enjoying training over the last few months?

It’s fantastic. I’ve tried to get around at those sessions as much as possible and talk to the people that are here, to make sure they know that I want them to feel connected to the team. The numbers have been great and you certainly feel the passion of the supporters. We want to feel that in a positive way in 2026.

Any potential ice-breakers that they can raise with you?

I just wander up and say ‘my name is Chris’ and see what they want to talk about! It’s been overwhelmingly positive, and that’s been a fantastic thing. Our supporter base can have a massive influence on our group, and I’m sure they will with the team performing.

What does Carlton look like when it is at its best?

United, connected, supporting the people who are here. That’s the big thing for me. You want the playing group to look like they’re united, so the people who are supporting them can jump on board. We’ve seen that in the pre-season so far, and we want to continue to see it.

Also, we’ve all got to be open to feedback from time to time. We don’t get everything right, and the Club has been open to try and listen to the supporter base to get that connection at as good a level it possibly can be. We also know that our responsibility is to perform on the field.

What does success look like for Carlton in 2026? 

It’s still to take further steps forward. We’re going to be a better version of what we can be as the season goes on. We’ve seen a little snippet right now of two games where I feel like we’ve gotten better as the game has progressed, and I think that’s most likely to be the case this season. We want to win more games than we lose, we’re all competitors.

Michael Voss is the best competitor I’ve ever seen and he’ll want the team to continue to take steps forward. We can’t lose sight of celebrating the small wins that we get from week to week as well, and what I do know is Michael won’t lose sight of that either.