The brutal truth is the Carlton Blues are a club in disarray
A year after the previous chairman resigned over a salacious photo scandal, there was some cautious optimism about the new look of Carlton Football Club.
Few expected senior coach Michael Voss to remain beyond this season or for the club to reach the final following the departure of three senior players. But the Blues had a new chief executive, a new football boss and a new roster of assistants rotating around the veteran coach.
But as they say, losing reveals the cracks in football clubs where their winning credentials lie. First, it was revealed that new CEO Graham Wright approached Collingwood coach Craig McRae last year – directly or indirectly – about a move to the Blues. Former captain Sam Docherty’s brutal assessment of the team’s repeated failures on the field was then made public.
All senior coaches have mentors, but an awkward situation arose because Voss had a paid mentor named Adam Simpson, who also worked as a media commentator. Simpson had to evaluate the Blues’ end-of-game surrenders multiple times each week.
None of the above will matter as AFL football operations and medical boss Laura Kane considers Carlton’s account of what happened at the MCG on April 16. Troubled footballer Elijah Hollands, who was delisted by a disappointing Voss last year and later re-selected after returning to health and fitness, was selected to play and was on the field for more than 60 per cent of the game against Collingwood.
The harsh truth is that the club’s treatment of Hollands, who was hospitalized in the days following that infamous night, reveals that Carlton Football Club and its management are a group in disarray. Whatever other struggles the Blues endured behind the scenes, their leadership and system deficiencies were exposed through their losses, the failure to adequately deal with Hollands that night brought the club’s bad side to light.
The club’s handling of the ensuing fallout has also fallen well short of expectations from headquarters, Carlton members and fans, and the wider football and sporting community.
No one is blaming Travis Boak for his poor handling of Hollands, but it’s worth noting that the Blues have added another layer to their football operations this season with the addition of the former Port Adelaide captain in a leadership and culture role, and we are yet to witness the results. The internal communication failure in the sixth round is mirrored by Carlton’s mundane external messages.
Requesting Hollands’ privacy as the club’s mismanagement exposed the player and his problems (which the media respects), Carlton took a week to deliver a written explanation of what had happened to the horrified head office.
Carlton did not present enough, even taking into account how upset some club bosses, medical staff, players and coaches were about what was happening and how difficult it was to confront the public.
No one expressed any remorse for what had transpired and in fact the club chose to show the media and news coverage of a series of events that unfolded in prime time that I have never witnessed in my memory.
You can’t help thinking that Voss would be at least one person who would take the blame for allowing Hollands to continue playing. After all, he was the head coach who knew his player was struggling and spoke to him at halftime, and Hollands told him he wanted to continue playing.
And Voss had to face the media on Thursday, as is normal in the weekly football news cycle. Perhaps football boss Chris Davies or Wright (the latter of whom held a press conference last Sunday) would have been more suitable given the circumstances, but that will obviously come as the AFL forms its own view of Carlton’s working practices.
Voss came prepared with notes. He defended his wand strongly, as it was his right, and refused to explain what happened during the match. He threatened to end the press conference if questions about Hollands’ conduct continued, and finished his speech by turning the attention to the media once again. Voss stated that everyone has a mental health problem in themselves or around them and called on the media to think about this issue.
“Unfortunately, instead of turning this into a private fight, we made it a public event,” Koç said. “So the commentary, the play-by-play, unfortunately we’ve brought it to this point.”
Voss badly missed the mark here. As my colleague Sam McClure points out, Voss and his team created this public event by continuing to play Hollands in the second half in front of nearly 80,000 people on national television’s prime-time broadcast at the MCG, despite red flags.
Carlton have continued to miss the target since that night.
It was claimed that Hollands was remorseful immediately after the game when the coach failed to explain what had happened. Voss said he felt Hollands let the coach down, and that narrative continued as the week progressed. Hollands felt terrible about the pressure he was putting on everyone at Carlton.
By the time Wright, an experienced football boss but inexperienced chief executive, appeared in the media last Sunday, two full days had passed with no explanation and only a brief press release; Frankly, either Wright or his football lieutenant Davies eventually had to come forward.
But he offered nothing by way of explanation. He admitted that the club knew Hollands was having difficulty during the match but could not say why no one intervened forcefully. Although multiple Collingwood sources said Hollands had told them he had been drinking, Wright said he had no idea “at this stage”.
Voss said comments made after the Collingwood game on Thursday bordered on “bullying” and went on to defend his staff who were victims of said bullying. He said families of these Carlton people – presumably football officials, coaches and medical staff – were affected.
The AFL’s assessment of Carlton’s medical staff appears particularly concerning given the increasing pressure on club doctors regarding concussion, the ARC operation, their significant role in illegal drugs legislation and the increased risk of general medical liability. The game goes beyond the volunteer framework that has served it for decades.
This includes club doctors, who in many cases are beginning to question the value of combining their increasingly scrutinized matchday roles with separate medical practices.
Even if we accept that Carlton staff, including Voss, went above and beyond in helping Hollands and showing him care and empathy, the accusation of bullying was frankly unacceptable given the circumstances. Today was not the day for finger pointing.
The AFL is the largest sporting competition in the country. It may require compassion, but it also requires ruthlessness, a winning culture, and external and internal scrutiny like few other fields. Voss should know this; This is how the Gladiator led the Brisbane Lions in their glory years.
Whether the AFL investigation into Carlton, which continues next week, punishes the club and exploits its failure to further reform matchday training, the inevitable conclusion is that the Blues – despite their best intentions – failed their player against Collingwood at the MCG.
Their practices, which put the entire competition under the spotlight, could not meet the level of professionalism required by the game.
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Caroline Wilson is a Walkley-winning columnist and former chief football writer for The Age.Connect via email.
