CARLTON president Stephen Kernahan has backed Mick Malthouse to lead the restructuring of the club.
Scrutiny of the Blues' future has intensified after their 81-point thumping by arch-rival Essendon on Sunday night.
Despite queries over Malthouse's impact in the top job at Carlton, Kernahan believes he is the right man to lead the club in its list overhaul.
"Mick Malthouse is going to build a side at this football club. There'll be another draft at the end of this year, it'll be uncompromised which helps a lot more," Kernahan told Channel Nine's Footy Classified.
"We'll have another draft the year after, so I fully expect Mick to shape the side and I fully expect us to be better than what we were last night and for the next 19 weeks."
Despite the Blues' horror start to 2014, Malthouse's future as senior coach is secure, accorÍÍding to Kernahan.
"The last thing I'm worrying about if we're being coached well. Mick Malthouse is a fantastic coach and he's doing a great job with our blokes," he said.
The Blues president, who conceded he had been angered by his club's three straight losses, put the acid on Carlton's players to show some fight against Melbourne at the MCG on Saturday.
"I've got nothing else to say, other than about us trying to wipe out what happened on Sunday night, this Saturday," he said.
"I expect our blokes to come out with something fierce this weekend."
It was a sentiment backed by Carlton skipper Marc Murphy on Monday afternoon, when he also added his voice to support for Malthouse.
"He's so positive and he makes things very simple for the side," Murphy told radio station SEN
"I'm just hoping that last night is one of those things, (where) nothing went right for us.
"When the chips are down, that's when you find out about characters around footy clubs.
"So we'll find out about certain blokes in our side over the next month and obviously the rest of the season.
"I'm sure you'll see a very good response this Saturday."
Meanwhile, Blues ruckman Matthew Kreuzer hopes his latest bout of surgery has fixed his troublesome foot.
Kreuzer went under the knife last week for the second time, after having a similar operation in the off-season on the foot he injured in the Blues' elimination final win against Richmond.
He is expected to miss between 12 and 14 weeks.
"Hopefully it's all fixed now. I had the operation on Friday, so I had a bit of a bone graft and a plate put in," Kreuzer told Fox Footy's On The Couch.
"So hopefully that does the trick now."
Kreuzer's progress has been hampered by a long list of injuries, included an ACL injury in 2010 that required a full knee reconstruction.
Despite some questioning why he was taken with pick No.1 in the 2007 NAB AFL Draft, the Blues' big man said he still has improvement left in his game.
"You can say that, but that's football isn't it? It's a contact sport – you've just got to cop them (injuries) and get back to improving when you do get back out on the field," Kreuzer said.
"You look back and there's always things like the knee or whatever, it's just one of those things that you need to keep improving and I'm still developing my game."
