CARLTON coach Michael Voss has praised his leaders for driving a simplified game plan that has turned the team's season around since the bye, with the Blues winning a third straight match by more than 50 points to ignite their season.
Fremantle fell victim to Carlton's stripped back, high-pressure style on Sunday at Optus Stadium, with the 53-point win moving the Blues to 11th on the ladder and just one win behind eighth-placed Geelong.
Voss said his team had not earned the right to dream about what was possible this season and would remain in the moment, with the coach thrilled with his players' ability to get the game on their terms through pressure and field position.
DOCKERS v BLUES Full match coverage and stats
"We've no doubt simplified it significantly and the boys have enjoyed that and certainly bought into it. As a result, we're obviously playing some better footy," Voss said on Sunday night.
"The players need to take some credit for the way that the leaders have gone after that period of time. No one stepped away from their responsibilities. We absolutely own where we're at.
"We had to accept we are out a bit first before we could make any change. And the leaders have really driven that.
"We're not taking anything for granted right now. We're just living in the present and taking it all in and enjoying these experiences, [like] coming away together in a pretty challenging environment, and we walk away with the four points."
Voss said he could not have asked more of makeshift ruck duo Jack Silvagni and Lewis Young, who could not match Fremantle ruckman Sean Darcy's hit-out dominance but contributed to a clearance win for the Blues.
The coach said he was more hopeful on ruckman Tom De Koning being available for next Saturday's clash against Port Adelaide at Marvel Stadium than fellow big man Marc Pittonet.
Midfielder Matt Kennedy will be sent for scans on a knee injury, with the significance not yet known, while defender Mitch McGovern suffered a corked leg after an errant knee from teammate Jacob Weitering.
With the Power litmus test looming, Voss said the Blues would not start looking too far ahead. "Over the course of the season, we haven't earned that right, so we'll just keep our eyes right in front of us," the coach said.
While the result was a shot of life for the Blues' season, it left the 14th-placed Fremantle with a mountain to climb to play finals, given the team's poor percentage and tough draw.
Coach Justin Longmuir said the message to his players after a fourth loss in five games, and ahead of a trip to the MCG to take on flag fancy Collingwood, was "don't wallow in your own self-pity".
"We're all disappointed, but we've got six days lead up to a great challenge," the coach said.
"So, we need to get around each other. We need to help each other get better and we need to bounce back."
The most worrying aspects of Sunday's loss for Longmuir included a contest lesson in the midfield and an inability to compete well enough in the aerial contests.
The Dockers couldn't handle the Blues' defensive pressure and didn’t mount any significant challenge when the Blues ripped the game apart in the third quarter with six unanswered goals.
"Definitely in that third quarter we internalised, got stuck in our own heads," Longmuir said.
"The scoreboard got out of control, players would have been worried about their own form, and we just went away from any semblance of a connected brand.
"We spoke about that at three-quarter time, and it was better in the last quarter. We spoke about it after the game.
"You've got to fight through momentum as a team, you can't fight through it individually. We tried to fight individual battles rather than connecting as a team."
