Youthful Blues

[Silvagnis]

Link to the article - Youthful Blues

In each of its four wins for 2007, Carlton was the younger team. On two of these occasions Carlton was on average at least one year younger; in the other two, six months younger.

The proportion of games played by players 19 or younger hardly moved over the three-year period, suggesting that Carlton played a similar number of first-year draftees in each year (or those draftees played the same amount of games). Furthermore, the proportion of games played in the 20, 22 and 23-year age bracket hardly changed over 2006 to 2007. What does this mean? It means that a large driver of the additional games played under the age of 21 came from players in their second and third years, not from their first. This is evidenced by good games from Murphy, Walker, Blackwell, Kennedy (now departed), Russell, Bower and Betts.

Now let’s not doubt that more and more younger players were given games by the Club in this time period. From five Under 21’s in 2005, to 10 in 2006 and to 15 in 2007, the number of young players getting a game at Carlton has increased. But the simple fact is that this is due to young players, such as those listed above, demanding games as their career develops. The Blues have an emerging young list that will only get better with experience – add to that the recruitment of Judd and Hadley and we all have the right to allow ourselves more than a little hope for Season 2008.

Get on board.

 

[Mike & Dan]

Thanks for posting that, General.

We decided to have a look at this given all the banter from other fans about tanking, and were surprised with the results.

Perhaps a bigger surprise was that in our biggest 2 losses for the year, Carlton was actually the older team. On the flip side we were younger in each of our 4 wins.

M&D