Dale Thomas is under the belief that the door is "ajar" for him to continue his AFL career, but doesn't believe it will happen.
The Blues decided they would move on from Thomas at the end of the 2019 season, ultimately forcing Thomas to 'retire'.
Thomas has been in talks about a possible return, but is seemingly enjoying retirement.
“The lack of interest has been underwhelming,” Thomas told SEN Breakfast on Friday.
“I got a little nibble early, but we’ll just see where that finishes up.
“To be completely honest, the mental refreshment of knowing it has all come to an end in some degree and not having to get up and start running after the couple of weeks you get off and have to get back to the gym … the ability just to do whenever I want has been refreshing. I’m just enjoying being able to do that.”
Thomas averaged 19 disposals a game in 2019 across half back and was arguably one of the Blues' most consistent players.
But despite the positives to come from 2019, Thomas understood Carlton's decision to move on.
“The good thing for the club and the position they’re in is when you don’t need to keep the older blokes around,” he said.
“They’re not really going to push for a premiership next year and you can start blooding a young player so that when we are in that premiership window whether it be in two, three or four years time and these blokes have got experience.
“From a club point of view, it’s a good thing to move me on, but from a personal point of view it’s obviously very disappointing. At the same time, I fully understand it.
“I feel like I’ve been on borrowed time for the last couple of years.
“A few years ago my form wasn’t great and body wasn’t great either. It was realistic that I could have been delisted then, so the club was good enough to put some faith in me and I feel like I repaid that with my last couple of seasons, one with what I was able to do on the field, and two with what I was able to do developing some of the younger kids.”
