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6 hours ago
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There’s no real ‘aura’ about him. There’s no corporate speak. There are no vows to ‘lean into it’, to ‘own it’, or to ‘make Carlton great again’. There’s just the most low-key of locums, a very un-Carlton-like figure, a man who’s done the hard slog of coaching at the lower levels, who’s been able to mend what was a demoralised group. And there are a lot of wins. There’s a solid body of evidence that Josh Fraser knows what he’s doing, that his players are responding to him and that he’s the right man for the job. Whoever gets the nod, given the young talent on display on the weekend in a 76-point demolition of the reigning premiers Brisbane, it will be a good job to get.
Still, prior to the weekend’s 24.10 (154) to 11.12 (78) win, few had Carlton pegged as anything more than a lower middle-class team – honest and vastly improved under their new coach yes, but probably no threat to the higher echelon of the competition. But their performance against Brisbane is probably as well as they’ve played since the opening round of the 2024 season, when they mowed down the Lions at the Gabba in one of the biggest comebacks in the history of the game. On Saturday they posted their biggest score since August 2012 when they walloped an Essendon team that started the season well but fell in a heap after Stephen Dank’s peptides wore off. Carlton being Carlton, they then sacked Brett Ratten 12 days later.
The Blues moved the ball with speed, purpose and precision, used propulsive handball to great effect, smashed a crack group of Lion midfielders and nailed their set shots. Perhaps most pleasingly, they got stellar performances out of their crop of young players, with six of them 21 or under. Former list manager Nick Austin was shown the door not long after Michael Voss – collateral damage of sorts. He can consider himself desperately unlucky. His high selections Harry Dean and Jagga Smith rank among some of the best young footballers in Australia. But Austin also had a shrewd eye at the middle to lower reaches of the draft, with Talor Byrne (pick 45), Billy Wilson (34) and Cooper Lord (pick nine in the mid-season rookie draft) delivering in spades against Brisbane.
When Dean was drafted, he confessed to a dose of white line fever, which he said came from his mum. For those of us who saw his dad, Peter, play, his mum must be some sort of ferocious competitor. He may quinella the Rising Star award with Smith, who had an outstanding night and won the Robert Walls medal. He has exactly what they’ve been missing in recent years – speed, skill and class. And Fraser has got the best out of him.
Not many saw this result coming, with Brisbane having won seven on the trot. As always, they like to feel out their opponent early in games. It’s like watching Novak Djokovic in the first half hour of a five-setter. Like the Serb, they usually probe and coast and conserve until there’s a whoosh period where both the viewer and the opponent suddenly realise the match is over. On this occasion, it was the Blues who dropped the hammer. A few months ago, a hefty half-time lead was a source of anxiety for all involved at Carlton. And three Brisbane goals in as many minutes just before the main break would have added to that. But the Blues simply continued on their rampaging way.
The Lions were incredibly disappointing. After quarter-time, they were a cranky, listless, ill-disciplined team. They were arguing the toss, shanking set shots sideways, and playing on when they were already out of bounds. The knock on them in 2026 has been the way they defend. Some of it is just rotten luck with injuries. But some is down to a midfield, Josh Dunkley aside, that doesn’t always prioritise the defensive side of their game. It’s the eighth time this year they’ve conceded more than 100 points. Brodie Kemp put four goals on them in about 20 minutes, almost all of them from contested marks that the Brisbane backline of 2024 and 2025 would have thwacked away. After Ty Gallop’s suspension last week, they were forced to play Eric Hipwood down back. Hipwood is a lot of things – much maligned, occasionally bewildering, structurally important and a convenient whipping boy – but he isn’t a backman. Losing Ryan Lester with a bung shoulder only added to their defensive challenges. Only a dolt would write them off. But their clash with Hawthorn this Friday at the Gabba looms as one of the most important games of the season.
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