CARLTON veteran Ed Curnow has taken exception to former teammate Rhys Palmer's slap at the Blues' culture.
Without mentioning Carlton specifically, Palmer's Twitter post during the Blues' dismal first half against Fremantle on Saturday was a none-too-subtle dig at his old club.
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"Everyone talks about draft picks and developing youth but no one ever talks about culture...." Palmer, who played one game for Carlton last season before being delisted, tweeted.
Palmer played 123 matches across 10 seasons with stints at the Dockers and GWS before he was thrown a brief lifeline by the Blues.
Carlton kicked just seven points in a miserable first-half display at Etihad Stadium to trail by 70 points before managing to limit the damage in a 57-point loss.
Curnow appeared on the Nine Network and was in no mood to dissect his former teammate's slight.
"It just annoys me that that gets traction, that comment," Curnow bristled.
"It's frustrating that Rhys feels like he has to make that comment.
"I think that only serves Rhys, so we'll just ignore that."
The Blues are anchored to the bottom of the ladder with just one win, halfway through the third season of a painstaking list rebuild under coach Brendon Bolton.
The lack of progress has led to speculation skipper Marc Murphy will explore his free agency options at the end of the season.
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The 30-year-old, who is currently nursing a foot injury, did little to dispel such talk when he told Triple M radio on Saturday that he was still considering his position.
"I think that might be him playing his cards in terms of contract talks and whatever he's worth come the end of the year," Curnow said.
"But I see him as a Carlton person and can't see him leaving.
"What I see with Murph week to week is that he is heavily involved in all the meetings, he's in discussions with the coaches about the future of the club and the team that we're playing on the weekend.
"So his involvement is full-hearted towards Carlton."
Meanwhile, Carlton's head of football, Andrew McKay, remains confident the Blues are on the (long) road to success.
"Our list management strategy three years ago was to go to three drafts, build from the bottom, and we think that's going to be the best possible thing for us to sustain success – and we still believe that," McKay said on 1116SEN on Sunday.
"We've really invested in the young kids going through the draft, but as we're finding now, we can't just do that, so we've had to get some more experienced players in to fill some gaps," McKay said.
"We know we've still got a lot of gaps there."
He said the middle tier of players needed to step up.
"The youngers will improve, but you can't expect them to shoulder the load and create the win or loss for us; they're there to provide the excitement and enthusiasm, whereas the middle tier guys provide the grunt work and the win or the loss so to speak, and so do the experienced guys."
