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Sorry PJ but another season of 4 wins next season and supporters have every right to be fed up. Just for the record when I say "fed up" it doesn't follow from this that you will 'jump off the bandwagon'; I think that the vast majority of supporters, no matter how "fed up" they are, will still support Carlton, I know for one that no matter how we're going I'll support us and go to all the games.
Anyway, if we have, for argument's sake another season of, let's say 5 wins next season, our 2002-06 period will look like this:
2002: 3 wins (under Wayne Britain - poor run with injuries)
2003 4 wins (start of Pagan era)
2004: 10 wins (would be an outlier, an anomaly)
2005: 4.5 wins
2006 (presumptiom): 5 wins.
This would mean PJ that from the start of the Pagan era, we'd have won, assuming only 5 wins in 2006, it would mean we'd have won 23 games in 4 years! And it's only 23 because 2004 would be an aberration among the seasons of 4 wins, 5 wins etc.
Even a coach like Denis Pagan would struggle to defend a record of 23 wins in 4 seasons.
I'm not saying that I want Denis gone; but I think being realistic after 2006 he'd have had 4 years at Carlton and I think by that stage, it's going to be hard to suppress the frustration and discontent among the throngs of Carlton supporters. You can talk about rebuilding pj, about how "Rome wasn't built in a day" etc and you're right. It might just be that Denis simply came at the wrong period of the club's history, he just happened to come at Carlton's nadir. But let's face it it's a results business and you have to be judged on how many games you win/lose, not how nice a bloke or how you coached all these premierships in the past.
Supporters have every right to be angry pj, and it's only going to get worse if we continue to struggle pj. Supporters just want to see Carlton win games of footy; I don't care how they win them, a win is a win and I and others want to see wins. I want season 2004 again, whatever people say about it now, I enjoyed it at the time, I enjoyed winning 10 games a hell of a lot more than I enjoy winning a lousy 4 or 5.
Nobody will jump off the ship pj but you can not blame supporters for expecting success; they've been brought up on it. You say that we can't handle a blip in the club's illustrious career, well, it's not easy when you're conditioned to success to accept failure, no matter how ephemeral the pain is, and that applies to more than just footy.
Why should the supporters have to sit through years of failure and just cop it on the chin because we've been spoilt previously? That's not how a football club should operate. Is it a selfish attitude? Maybe it is and maybe it isn't, but Carlton should be up there and currently it isn't. But the supporters want to see it rise as quickly as possible, we don't want to wait until 2010 to play finals and 2023 to win another flag. We are at a point now where we are sick of losing pj and we have every right to be. But you know the most galling thing pj? It is that in 2005 half the time we looked as if we lacked passion, hunger, heart, character etc, they could all be called into question. It is more tolerable (though still not acceptable) to lose when you've given everything; it's very difficult to swallow when you haven't. But then displaying passion, hunger etc you will win more games. Of course you need talent above all and we still need more to get to where we want to be, but effort and commitment counts as well.
So I think 2006 might be one of those seasons at the end of which we might need changes at the top. Hopefully it isn't the case and we win some bloody games of footy. But don't go about suggesting pj that people that are pissed off with the current situation are jumping off ship because that's rubbish.
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Formerly Blues-Back2003.
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