Writing on the wall now it seems.
While I'm not big on the messiah complex this club seems to have, Lyon could be what the underachieving list needs right now: a hard taskmaster who the players can't pull the wool over, as has been the case with Teague with the tail wagging the dog more often than not.
Very rarely do player-endorsed coaches work out, and that's what Teague was - the players pushed hard for his appointment.
I believe that by and large, Teague has had more talent to work with on a broader scale than what the past few Carlton coaches have had.
But one of the problems has been too many players getting away with doing the bare minimum for too long, cutting corners, turning up to pre-season unfit, only cracking in on game-day when it suits, and an acceptance that losing is OK. They're all by-products of an overriding poor culture, but the players would know all too well that they've been able to get away with a hell of a lot for a long time.
Quite often we've seen 'leaders' (and most players) of the side laughing and grinning with opposition after losses which are supposed to hurt, which I can't say I've seen happen with clubs with strong cultures.
One extreme example, which made me want to be ill, was in season 2020. Carlton are playing Adelaide (who were last on the ladder) late in the season, and it's Gibbs' last game.
Even before the ball was bounced, Carlton players are laughing and joking with Gibbs, and clearly not switched on. Here's Gibbs, a bloke that not only upped and left, but had tried to do so more than once, when the club was on its knees. That's his right, but the fact remains, he ditched the club and tried to do so more than once.
After the match, Murphy and Simpson rush over to chair him off! Gibbs played a blinder and was one of the best on the ground that day. Carlton had lost the game, got its pants pulled down in an embarrassing display to the bottom side, but also to a bloke who'd been playing reserves all year. That day, to me, was so befitting of the loser culture at Carlton. Loser culture. Wonder what the players and coaches of the '70s and '80s thought watching that?
Backslapping, grinning, laughing, before, during, and after the match with a bloke that had turned his back on the joint. It was one of the most weak as p1ss displays I've seen from a footy side (and its leaders), anywhere, and at any level.
Ross Lyon (or Clarkson) or whoever, won't be an instant fix to the deep-rooted culture problem, but maybe a step in the right direction and what this group of mollycoddled frauds need at this point in time. Time will tell.
(Watch this video and Caro and Kane Cornes are spot on, talking about the incident:
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