Carlton senior coach Michael Voss has reflected on the Blues' Friday night elimination final victory, lauding his playing group, and in particular, a few unsung heroes.
The Blues scraped home by six points against the Swans at the MCG, surviving a tense final 30 seconds after a late Hayden McLean goal brought Sydney to within a straight kick.
While Carlton had to withstand a second-half Swans rally, the Blues led from the outset of the contest, building their lead from stringent defensive pressure and swift attacking movement.
Speaking to the media post-game, Voss detailed his thoughts on Friday's frenetic ending, noting his side's 'defensive resilience' to stand up against the surging Swans.
"Last minute was a bit interesting, wasn't it? It had everything, had big moments, had plenty of mistakes, but somehow we found a [way] to hang on, so I guess that's what finals footy's all about, isn't it?" Voss said on Friday evening.
"You never know when the moment's going to turn up but you've got to be ready for it and we had a couple of really big efforts late to be able to help us get over the line.
"I think there's a defensive resilience to us now. We've spoken about that all year, it had to be a characteristic that we had to build within the team, and we won on defence at the end of the game.
"We didn't have momentum at all, it was completely against us, and we certainly weren't winning it through ball use, so we would like to have a few moments back going inside 50 and maybe change angles a couple more times, rather than let them intercept and get fast off it. So, we'll go to work on that but in behind that was a desperate team with [a] will to win and probably, in the end, won on a bit of heart, which I'm really pleased with."
With Harry McKay exiting the game due to concussion, Patrick Cripps managing just 21 disposals for the night, and two-time Coleman medallist Charlie Curnow registering just one major against a prolific Tom McCartin, the Blues were bolstered by the work of Carlton's less-heralded heroes; Jack Martin, Blake Acres, and Matt Cottrell, among other blue-collar Blues.
"Again, I think in the past as a footy club we might've been accused of waiting for our stars to do the job to get us over the line," continued Voss.
"That hasn't been a characteristic of this football team this year, I understand that there's a lot of focus on players that haven't played finals football and how long it's actually been, but what we've done is on the back of it played some really significant roles and the players have really embraced that.
"They've gone after it really hard and they've built trust amongst each other within the team, and that's where our difference make has been. So externally, the brilliance might get talked about [but] internally, we value the roles that our players have played.
"Having Cuningham come in, Fogarty, Owies, Cottrell, Acres has been able to do his job, we're winning off everyone being able to take their turn and that's been pretty special."
The Blues will revel in Friday's barrier-breaking victory before turning their attention to a critical semi-final matchup with the reeling Demons next weekend at the MCG.
