Carlton’s AFL dark days are gone, the swagger is back, and fans are smiling | Jonathan Horn

The undefeated Blues have a new coach, a watchable brand of football, a captain in fine fettle and a pretty soft draw ahead

David Foster Wallace once wrote that Michael Chang had the unhappiest face he had seen outside of a graduate creative writing program. A few years ago, I was on a city loop train when a group of Carlton fans alighted at Spencer St. Suddenly, I was confronted with an entire carriage of Michael Changs. I have never seen a more miserable-looking bunch. GWS were basically playing with 16 men and were 100 points up with a quarter to run. The Carlton fans had seen enough. Their team had broken them. They had lost faith, hope, interest and, in some cases, their marbles.

On Monday mornings, the players would issue tortured apologies. Former player Mark Maclure would appear on AFL 360 like a man contesting a parking ticket in the Magistrates Court. He would bemoan “20 years of rubbish”. What do they stand for, he would ask? What is in their DNA? After one game, the Herald Sun’s Mark Robinson questioned whether the Bluebirds, Carlton’s former dance troupe, would have tackled harder. After one of their players had transgressed, the entire playing group visited Ravenhall Prison. “One thing they lack,” Patrick Cripps said - presumably in reference to the inmates - “is a bit of purpose and direction”.