When Pagan came to the club he clearly brought with him his old plan of kick it long at every opportunity. Carey or no Carey, the players at north knew how to effect it and did so generally pretty well over a number of years. players also knew their roles from full-back through to full-forward, and looked like they gelled.

This simply has not happened so far at Carlton. For the first couple of years post-Denis was willing to watch without questioning as the players 'got used to it'.

However, from reading reports, from the last couple of matches, it seems as if we are not playing by that game plan at the moment, with guys looking to maintain possession (and looking lost in the process).

What is the current game plan? Do the players know what they are supposed to be doing? Is part of the problem continual positional changes and being made to play in positions they are not comfortable with?

Then again, it is only the 1st week of March. At least there is not the false hope offered by winning the Wiz cup and then being belted in the home and away season.

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"You're my boy(s), Bluuuee(s)..."

JMust like every aspect of this footy club right now the game plan is 'abit each way' type of game plan.they can switch... but we dont have a structure sorted out for them to switch...

If you look at the set ups we have around the ground theyre a joke.. players are either too defensively set up so they cant attack cohesively.. or they have no outriders for the kick ins..

And this Walker fixation they have of playing him exclusively defensively is killing me more than its killing him.

Its a dogs breakfast out there!!!

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Due to recent budget cuts and the rising cost of electricity, gas, and oil....... the Light at the End of the Tunnel has been turned off. We apologize for the inconvenience.

where damned if we do, where damned if we dont..... We can play this this way, that way, attacking or defensive we still no good and until he gets the fire power he needs then you will see results and thats what we are building towards getting quality kids into this list cause we have been starved of it for many years. Trading pics for top up players, poor list management bad culture crap coaches like Wayne brittain, draft penalties, loss of picks have taken there tole so how can you put the blame on Dennis this is the effect of those mentioned taking its tole on the Carlton Football Club and we deserve it we cheated we let this buffon run the club and now that we have new management moving into the future you still bitching and moaning.

Walks needs to learn you cant have him running around with out a defensive bone in his body that does not make you a good player HE IS STILL LEARNING and in years to come he will benefit from this. Most midfielders start from half back then move up thank god you not coaching this side.

He is in a no win situation he aint got the quality and if you ask me he has shown to much belief in some players to tinker with the game plan.

Youre teaching players to play football not become taggers.

Ill tell you what .. much more of this and you remember how we snagged blokes like Greg Wells and Val Perovic from shit clubs going nowhere??... well we will lose our Walkers and Russels...

Because they couldnt be possibly enjoying footy. theyre not being developed... you cant be developed as a FOOTBALLER by being a tagger.. in a defensive style of football genre that were putting out there.

Our kids are plateauing out.. theyre hitting a wall.
Watch Waite T Bird or Walker... or just about any other kid.. none are making a breakthrough!!!
Where were after them to improve they just hit a brick wall!!!...

We have to be interested in building platforms and developing not trying to defend records .

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This is something that has concerned me for some time. Like in all aspects of life there needs to be a plan. What is our plan at Carlton? We have off field issues and obvious on field issues. The off field issues are not necessarily public knowledge and will be handled by the new board. I hope that once the new board is in place we can get a coherent picture of where our club is going off field.
Now the on field. What happened yesterday is a reflection of where we are and yes we do not have the talent depth. We have made significant gains in that area but it is our middle level players that are just not up to the task. Look at the extensive list - Wiggins, Houlahan, Bannister, et al are all struggling and we have so few players in the top league that they cannot do the task as it is too huge. When this situation arises people start to play for their own "territory" or survival and the team aspects go. This is the same for any organisation sports team, business, school, whatever. IMHO this is what happened last year and it may well be the case again this year. As Synbad has said so many times, we do not have talent base as yet. My concern is we do not have a clear picture of what we will be trying to achieve this year. Are the young players being developed and taught what to do? I remember in an earlier thread how in an earlier intra club match Thornton berrated Marc Murphy in public, this should never happen. How can a team gel when that occurs? Symtomatic for mine of the apparent lack of a framework and agreed terms of reference for the team. What is the coaching plan? I need to believe and it will help me to believe if I know there is a plan and that there is buy in to this plan. Quite simply it is lack of leadership at its many levels and in its many forms. I know I am a long way away but I read all the footy threads here and it is easy to see why so many "supporters" are negative. This happens when there is an information vacuum. So come on you guys who have the inside access - what and where is that plan?
As for those who won't be renewing their membership - leave, we are better off without you!
I am a paid up member even though I never see any games. I am proud to be doing my bit to help our club climb back to where we want it to be - at the top of the heap!

Go Blues and where is that plan?

so how do we replenish that middle teir?

We wait. We draft. We watch them get older.

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This type of slight is alien in the more cultured part of the world - Walsh. Its up there with mad dogs, Englishmen and the midday sun!

When you come last.. and you know you will come last you move heaven and earth to bring a player into the club with the pedigree better than McLaren...

Its paramount!!!!

you come near the bottom 2 or 3 years.. you MUST walk away with a player better than what you already have.
easier said than done you say???

Well just look at clubs like Freo / StKilda and what they have snagged.

We tried to save the money... which is all good and well.. but our kids need something better than what we have to help them.!!!

The rest is bullshit!!!!

You must snag one!!!!

Thats why there is a psd and last gets first pick...!!!

But thats the role of our football manager.. anyone know who he is???

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Our game plan micmics our leadership....survival...everybody is playing for survival and nobody is playing for the team...and that starts from the top...the coaching reflects our playing pysche...survive at all costs and and try the band aid effect...we have become the footscray and the st kildas of late 80's...i cant believe it has taken me 3 years to believe it...and yesterday bought it all home...because we have some very good players...fevola(60-80 goals a season),waite( can be anything) fischer(80- 100 marks a season forward),stevens(elite midfielder) ,lappin(creative playmaker),betts(x factor),walker(x factor),murphy,kennedy,bower, the sky the limit but we have the worst coaching list in the competition...and we will not grow until there are seriuos changes....the truth hurts and it cuts deeply....

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#sayerscouldbetheman!!

After last season where Denis was going on about how our game plan was worked out in the pre season comp does everyone really think that Pagan would be revealing the game plan during our practice matches?

I certainly hope he hasn't because if that was the game plan we're in more trouble than I thought.

Our game plan was there for all to see.. trust me!!!!

I hope he doesnt flog them on the track again instead of having them do some skills work and tactics...

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As much as I have been a Pagan apologist for the last year or 3, I am very close to losing it with him, even if the players haven't (or have - depending on who you believe).

I don't think his game plan is a problem per se but there seem to be confusing instructions from the box. The way we set up means we just go hail mary into the F50 rather than searching for the best and correct option to kick into the F50. Pagan has always used direct corridor footy as the method, not just Hail-Mary-Bomb-It-In-Long. HMBIIL is not Pagan's gameplan.

My problem is that he can't seem to motivate the players. I don't know what's happening behind closed doors but the people-aspect of coaching and his failure in his department is unravelling quite quickly. I think his treatment of some of the players has been quite appalling - Simpson's early times were ridiculous. You can't give a kid 3 mins to spend on the field and if he makes a mistake with his first possession he gets dragged. Kids will seize up and become fearful of making mistakes and as any teacher knows, if you seize up you are more likely to make mistakes. And if you don't give positive encouragement, then they're GAWN.

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"A good composer does not initiate. He steals."

- Igor Stravinsky

I was there, there was no game plan except to bomb it into the forward line without any thought to where our forward were.

When you have players ignoring forwards on the lead and instead just bombing it as long as thye can to 1 on 4 situations, how can we simply blame the coach.

How can we blame the coach when Fisher lines up from 35 metres directly in front and kicks into the man on the mark.

Face it everyone - our list is terrible.

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In WADA we trust

Its called confidence, which clearly none of the players have. Please explain how one of the youngest teams in the competion dont have a skills coach, shit we dont have any current ex players as assistants. Just look at Hawthorn, Clarkson surrounded himself with Hardwick,Viney and ross smith...all hard nuts who never shirked an issue and compare that to us. Confidence is amazing thing...even Pagan says that it is 90% above the shoulders.

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#sayerscouldbetheman!!

Game plans - where's BV or Mav when you need them. Perhaps they can be clearer on the finer points but there's a few points I think need to be stated in this regard:

* Port permanently had an extra 2 players at half back, filling holes. At most times these players were taller agile players, either Chad Cornes, Bishop or even one of the ruckmen. When we went forward, espeically second quarter onwards, so many of our passes were to 2 on 1 situations. Often we were outmarked - I wonder if our forwards are trained to spoil when they are outnumbered.

* Rarely did we have ground cover in the forward line. Betts went off after missing an easy shot at goal and was hardly sighted. It seemed on teh fast break entries we had the above outnumbering, and then on the slow entries Port had the full flood. Unlike our practice game, we seemed unable to find that short pass to keep it in possession. If we tried it we generally muffed it.

* Forward line delivery was quite poor, but given the above 2 on 1 plays we werent good enough to be precise. Very rarely did we keep bouncing and take shots on goal over the extra defenders head.

* At ground level, Port played a huge group of players at half back to allow them to tackle our ballwinners and secondly, once gained possession, to soak up our tackles but still find a man. It was like 3 on 6 at times and of course the 6 won.

* Unlike Port, Carlton rarely played men back until it was too late or if we had secondary bounces in our D50. This allowed Port to score quite freely with a running group movement from their contested wins at half back. Often they would centre to the 50 metreline and slot an easy goal.


I list these points for people to consider what the Blues were up against, and what, if anything, the Coach could have done. It seemed to me that very little was done or changed in the game, but I'm just a footy fan. It seemed as though Carlton were trying to get the 1 on 1 type contesting game but you cannot win this but its 1 on 2 at most junctures. Further, It seemed as though Williams had a very simple game plan and they executed it well. Carlton appeared to have no answer to the above and lost confidence in the strategies some time late Q1 or early Q2.

I am sick to death of Pagan coming out and saying their confidence is shot, we know where we are at... Well surprise suprise Pagan so does all the Carlton supporters...we are ROCK BOTTOM.....
I have to say there is definitely something wrong at the club, perhaps all the talk that the players can't stand Pagan is coming into fruition on the ground.
Pagan only has one game plan and if that does not work we are in serious trouble. Whitnall is in our best week in week out because the ball is down the backline so often. He is being wasted in the backline and needs to get back in the forward line. When we won the NAB cup last year it was Whitnall and Fev that fired.
We got McLaren as a back up ruckman and backman, not once during the pre season games has he gone back there. Against Geelong we had Waitey at full back (what a joke that is).
I am a truthful Carlton supporter and I have to say that I doubt whether we will one game this year, if things don't change and change quickly.

Molsey were the two Port players in our back half a result of us flooding back or them?

Pagan continually pushes men into our defence and they applies the fast break forward . This year he has included a switch of play with the break . From what I have seen ( which is not much I might add).

Our problems occur once we are over the centre pushing forward.

There are either no options or the delivery is terrible . This is where we get hurt as the ball rebounds back twice as fast as it goes in. As we have all broken they have lose men every where.

Pagan needs to go in with conventional set up for a while and not flood back.

Players need to wait for an option to present themselves.

We have leading forwards and bugger all in the way of crumbers . so kick to the lead not the pack

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If you allow the Government to change the Laws in an emergency
They will create an Emergency to change the Laws

First of all a disclaimer – I know F all about coaching and suspect most posters here are in the same boat even so they don’t admit it.

Secondly in regard to game plan and implementing it. I recall how Hawthorn was slammed for great parts of last year how slowly they moved the ball from defense up forward. The coach was asked several times about it and stated that no- it was definitely not the game plan but the players were too young and inexperienced to implement his directions – but that it would happen.

Also remember attending a function with Pagan speaking a couple of years ago and he said that people over estimate how much a coach can do during a game. He said that coaching is about “processâ€

You dont need to know much about coaching.. and you dont...

But im sure you can recognise a train wreck when you see one cant you???

Theyre pretty hard to miss...

Look, after 3 years if you cant get your message across.. and even in practice games its the same..,. its never going to happen.

I dont need us to win to be content.. i just want us playing with some kind of system and pride.

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Sydney it was both but in different guises. Carlton played a 2-3 man forward line for the fast break without any real flankers, and Port left their men back. (their direct opponents)

but on the return, when Port had this gang of runners at half back it didn't look as though Carlton were flooding at all. IN fact in the first half when the game was there to be won Port had a wonderfully free forward line with heaps of space and it did not appear as though we ever flooded with the exception of secondary ball-ups. Our spare players appeared to be in midfield to support the fast break plays, but we fell down say at 30-50metres by losing the 2 on 1's. Other than a brief spurt by McGrath on the outer wing we didn't seem to have the ability to create the shorter passes (that went forward) for the betterment of our forward opportunities. Think of it as a wave of water running through a midfield of stationery buoys - you cant lock them down if they['re any good with the footy. And they were.

To me we were out-thought. Their structure seemed to work very well and this allowed them to compete tightly in defence but ryn through our midfield with relative ease. I reject all this passion-less stuff because theres passion and intent, the problem is when we break down we need back-up plans or some ability to lock down a few contests when other teams have a run-on. The skill level dropped as our players saw walls of Port players ahead. Bentick had probably 5-6 inside 50 entries but to pick a pass where your leading forwards are outnumbered and still a little slow (Fev and Waite) must have broken his heart. Inevitably this affected the kicks, turnover, Port would outnumber us in our own forward line and score relatively easily.