Intra-Club Practice Match
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CARLTON held its first serious hit-out of the year at Visy Park on Friday, with the intra-club practice match providing a glimpse of things to come for the post-Fevola era Blues.
All four ruckmen played and looked in excellent condition, with Shaun Hampson and Matthew Kreuzer spending some time up forward with Robert Warnock and Sam Jacobs predominantly on the ball.
Setanta O'hAilpin, Lachie Henderson and eye-catching rookie Levi Casboult completed the tall options with the hit-out giving the Blues' coaching staff plenty of food for thought.
"We came under a little bit of criticism for not recruiting some talls [recently] but you saw today that our stocks of talls, both around the ball in the ruck and up forward, are well and truly replenished," assistant coach Mark Riley said after the match.
"We haven't finalised what we're going to play in the front half and I think one of the beauties of that is that we'll be quite unpredictable.
"We went long a couple of times … which is hasn't been akin to how we've played before.
"Our entries into the forward 50 won't just be hitting up a lead all the time. "
Warnock's form will be particularly pleasing for the Blues' faithful who didn't get to see the prized recruit in action all last season.
He provided some deft tap work and went in hard with one crunching mark running back with the flight drawing applause from the approximately 2000-strong crowd.
Casboult's form in attack also drew plenty of praise in the stands with some impressive grabs a feature.
"He came to us with very reduced fitness levels and the kid's already dropped 10 [kilograms]," Riley said.
"But it was exciting how he squeezed the air out of the first couple coming out of the box. He's a big, powerful kid."
Forgotten forward Brad Fisher also showed he's not done yet with a lively performance thrusting him into forward calculations.
Skipper Chris Judd was saw plenty of the ball as did Bryce Gibbs, Mitch Robinson, Shaun Grigg and Andrew Carrazzo.
Robinson provided the highlight of the day when he rose high over O'hAilpin to take a superb mark with his overall performance suggesting bigger things to come in his second AFL season
Most importantly, Riley reported no injuries from the at times willing encounter.
As for the higher-profile absentees, Kade Simpson and Simon Wiggins joined Marc Murphy and Jarrad Waite - who are returning from longer-term injuries - on the sidelines.
Andrew Walker, Eddie Betts and Ryan Houlihan all looked in excellent nick with Riley confident they will be capable of playing in the first round of the premiership season, despite a NAB Cup ban due to their pre-Christmas indiscretions.
Carlton's latest first-round draft pick Kane Lucas showed glimpses of class playing off a wing with Riley delighted with the pre-season the youngster has been able to put in.
