14 hours ago
AFL 2025: Carlton coach Michael Voss refuses to address growing noise around his future
Embattled Carlton coach Michael Voss is refusing to put energy into discussions and external comments around his future as heat on his position reaches boiling point.
The Blues lost to North Melbourne by 11 points on Saturday, putting a huge dent in their finals hopes that effectively go on the line in Thursday's crunch clash with Port Adelaide.
The defeat sparked mass commentary, with AFL great Lance Franklin calling for Carlton to move on from Voss and captain Patrick Cripps stopping for an impromptu media op to defend his coach.
But Voss said he wasn't rushing to catch up on the daily news around his job security, and there had been no discussions with the club's bosses this week, including chief executive Brian Cook or the man most likely to replace him, Graham Wright.
'No, and it is sort of an unnecessary conversation right now other than being in complete communications with them at all time,' Voss said.
'That has been really valuable and having the leadership of those two guys and Rob (Priestley) as our president, they are outstanding leaders and they are only interested in alignment and in solving it together and the support I feel.'
Voss said there was only one place he was directing his 'energy' and that was on Port, a game coming just five days after the loss to the Roos.
'I don't deal in hypotheticals like that, you can go for your life. As far as what we're concerned, we've come off a game what four days ago,' he said.
'As you can imagine, you tend to focus a lot of your energy on turning around what was a disappointing loss and turn that into something else.
'Obviously, jumped on a plane today and got a game tomorrow. As you can understand, we haven't drifted too far beyond that.'
Voss said the Blues would make few tweaks this week after not reviewing last Saturday's poor loss in entirety.
'We probably had the focus on the most important things and that was probably more to do with recovery,' he said.
'We didn't have time to delve into the game in its entirety, it's sort of one of those weeks where you've got to move on pretty quick.
'We touched on the most important things and now we've got to be able to fix our eyes on Port.
'It was pretty obvious, clearly the contest part of the game and some drift moments in defence … we gave it a good throw at the end to have a crack at it, but the distance was far too much for us to peg it back.'
Carlton will unveil two debutants this week, with Billy Wilson and Flynn Young confirmed to face Port Adelaide.
Wilson, a medium defender, was taken by the Blues with pick 34 of the 2023 draft, while Young was taken in this year's mid-season draft.
Young was a part of the all-conquering Werribee side that took out the VFL premiership last season and produced a haul of draftees since.
'(Wilson is) a terrific young man, he's been working on his game really hard, so he's certainly earnt his opportunity,' Voss said.
'Flynn Young will also play his debut as well, to have our sixth, seventh debutant for the year, to have exposure for these young men to come in and get roles done.
'It's a credit to them, the work they've done, and also a real shout out to our development team.
'In the last four or five weeks we've seen a real acceleration in a lot of these young men's careers. They've got them AFL ready and now they're getting their opportunity.'
