2021 Carlton Football Club season

The 2021 AFL season will be the 125th season of the VFL/AFL competition since its inception in 1897; and, having competed in every season, it will also be the 124th season contested by the Carlton Football Club.

Contractually, Carlton's primary home ground will continue to be the Melbourne Cricket Ground, with many games also to have been played at Marvel Stadium, and traditional home ground Ikon Park to serve as the training and administrative base. The club will field its women's team in the fifth season of the AFL Women's competition, and Ikon Park will serve as the home ground for AFL Women's matches. Restrictions associated with the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic meant that crowds were often restricted to well short of the grounds' maximum capacities.

Carlton terminated its alignment with the Northern Blues in the Victorian Football League in March 2020 as a cost-saving measure during the coronavirus pandemic; and will re-establish its reserves team for the first time since 2002, which will contest its fourth overall season in the VFL.[1]

For the fourth consecutive season, the club set a new membership, surpassing the 2020 total of 67,035 members on 1 February. The club became debt-free for the first time since financing the construction of Ikon Park's Legends' Stand in 1996, having cleared $7 million in debt since 2017, despite the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. The club also ceased to accept financial assistance from the AFL.[2]

Mark Lo Giudice continued as club president, a role he had held since mid-2014.

David Teague continued in his second full season as appointed senior coach, having also served a half-season as caretaker in 2019. The coaching panel was reduced in size as a result of seeking cost savings and meeting the AFL's soft spending cap due to the coronavirus pandemic, which saw head of coaching performance Henry Playfair,[3] former Northern Blues senior head coach Josh Fraser,[4] development coach Jason Davenport,[5] and specialist coaches Saverio Rocca, Hamish McIntosh and Greg Williams were all made redundant.[6] Added to the club's coaching panel in the new development role as leader of the Carlton College of Sport Development Program and Carlton Academy coach was former Western Jets and Hawthorn development coach Torin Baker.[7]

The following is Carlton's squad for the 2021 season.

Statistics are correct as of end of 2020 season. Flags represent the state of origin, i.e. the state in which the player played his Under-18s football.

Senior List[8]
No.	State	Player	Hgt (cm)	Wgt (kg)	Date of Birth	Age (end 2020)	AFL Debut	Recruited from	Games (end 2020)	Goals (end 2020)
1		Jack Silvagni	194	89	17 December 1997	23	2016	Oakleigh (U18)	63	47
2		Paddy Dow	187	83	16 October 1999	21	2018	Bendigo (U18)	42	15
3		Marc Murphy (lg)	180	80	19 September 1987	33	2006	Oakleigh (U18)	285	189
4		Lochie O'Brien	185	78	18 September 1999	21	2018	Bendigo (U18)	36	10
5		Sam Petrevski-Seton	182	78	19 February 1998	22	2017	Claremont	80	19
6		Zac Williams	185	84	20 September 1994	26	2013	GWS Academy, GWS	113	27
8		Lachie Fogarty	180	76	1 April 1999	21	2018	Western (U18), Geelong	23	6
9		Patrick Cripps (c)	195	92	18 March 1995	25	2014	East Fremantle	118	54
10		Harry McKay	204	99	24 December 1997	23	2017	Gippsland (U18)	48	71
11		Mitch McGovern	191	93	11 October 1994	26	2016	Claremont, Adelaide	76	98
12		Tom de Koning	203	97	16 July 1999	21	2018	Dandenong (U18)	9	1
13		Liam Stocker	184	83	23 January 2000	20	2019	Sandringham (U18)	5	0
14		Liam Jones (lg)	199	97	24 February 1991	29	2010	North Hobart, Western Bulldogs	142	84
15		Sam Docherty (c)	187	87	18 October 1993	27	2013	Gippsland (U18), Brisbane Lions	108	14
16		Jack Carroll	187	79	20 December 2002	18	–	East Fremantle	–	–
17		Brodie Kemp	192	89	1 May 2001	19	–	Bendigo (U18)	–	–
18		Sam Walsh (lg)	184	80	2 July 2000	20	2019	Geelong (U18)	39	14
20		Lachie Plowman	193	90	11 September 1994	26	2013	Calder (U18), GWS	110	1
21		Jack Martin	186	82	29 January 1995	25	2014	Claremont, Gold Coast	112	93
22		Caleb Marchbank	193	93	7 December 1996	24	2015	Murray (U18), GWS	48	0
23		Jacob Weitering (lg)	196	98	23 November 1997	23	2016	Dandenong (U18)	93	10
24		Nic Newman	187	83	15 January 1993	27	2017	Frankston, Sydney	53	14
25		Zac Fisher	177	75	15 June 1998	22	2017	Perth	63	27
27		Marc Pittonet	202	105	3 June 1996	24	2016	Oakleigh (U18), Hawthorn	20	0
28		David Cuningham	185	85	30 March 1997	23	2016	Oakleigh (U18)	37	20
29		Corey Durdin	173	72	14 February 2002	18	–	Central District	–	–
30		Charlie Curnow	192	96	3 February 1997	23	2016	Geelong (U18)	58	77
31		Tom Williamson	190	85	12 December 1998	23	2017	North Ballarat (U18)	32	2
32		Jack Newnes	186	82	24 February 1993	27	2012	Northern (U18)	172	68
33		Sam Ramsay	180	72	21 March 2001	19	—	Calder (U18)	–	–
34		Sam Philp	185	80	4 August 2001	19	2020	Northern (U18)	2	1
35		Ed Curnow (lg)	180	85	7 November 1989	31	2011	Geelong (U18), Adelaide, Box Hill	182	40
40		Michael Gibbons	175	75	15 May 1995	25	2019	Williamstown	36	27
41		Levi Casboult	201	101	15 March 1990	30	2012	Dandenong (U18)	141	148
42		Adam Saad	178	78	23 July 1994	26	2015	Calder (U18), Coburg, Gold Coast, Essendon	109	8
43		Will Setterfield	192	87	5 February 1998	22	2017	Sandringham (U18), GWS	36	10
Rookie List[8]
No.	State	Player	Hgt	Wgt	Date of Birth	Age	Debut	Recruited from	Games	Goals
7		Matthew Kennedy	190	88	6 April 1997	23	2016	Collingullie-Glenfield Park, GWS	48	23
19		Eddie Betts	174	74	26 November 1986	34	2005	Calder (U18), Adelaide	331	613
26		Luke Parks	189	93	18 April 2001	19	–	Sydney Academy, Glenelg	–	–
36		Josh Honey	184	79	17 October 2001	19	2020	Western (U18)	1	0
46		Matthew Cottrell	181	72	29 February 2000	20	2020	Dandenong (U18)	5	2
Senior coaching panel[9]
	State	Coach	Coaching position				Carlton Coaching debut	Former clubs as coach
		David Teague	Senior coach				2008	Carlton (d), Northern Bullants (s), West Coast (a), St Kilda (a), Adelaide (a)
		Luke Power	Head of development				2020	GWS (a), AFL Academy Manager
		John Barker	Assistant coach (stoppages)				2011	St Kilda (a), Hawthorn (a)
		Cameron Bruce	Assistant Coach (forward)				2018	Hawthorn (a)
		Dale Amos	Assistant Coach (defence)				2016	South Barwon (s), Geelong (a), Geelong reserves (s)
		Daniel O'Keefe	Development Coach (Midfield), Reserves coach				2020	Geelong Falcons (s), Geelong reserves (a)
		Brent Stanton	Development Coach (Midfield and transition)				2018
		Torin Baker	Carlton College of Sport and Academy coach				2021	Western Jets (s), Hawthorn (d)

• For players: (c) denotes captain, (vc) denotes vice-captain, (dvc) denotes deputy vice-captain, (lg) denotes leadership group.
• For coaches: (s) denotes senior coach, (cs) denotes caretaker senior coach, (a) denotes assistant coach, (d) denotes development coach, (m) denotes managerial or administrative role in a football or coaching department

The following summarises all player changes which occurred after the 2019 season. Unless otherwise noted, draft picks refer to selections in the 2020 National Draft.

The club lost two of its four most experienced players to retirement at the end of 2020: Kade Simpson retired after 18 seasons and 342 games, the third most in club history; and Matthew Kreuzer retired after 13 seasons and 189 games, having missed all but the first match in 2020 with injury.

In

Player	Former Club	League	via
Zac Williams	GWS	AFL	Restricted free agent signing; GWS received a first round draft pick as compensation.[10]
Lachie Fogarty	Geelong	AFL	AFL trade period, received along with a second-round draft selection (provisionally No. 38), in exchange for a higher second-round draft selection and a third-round draft selection (provisionally No. 30 and 51 respectively)[11]
Adam Saad	Essendon	AFL	AFL trade period, received along with a third-round draft selection and a fourth-round draft selection (provisionally No. 48 and 78), in exchange for a first-round draft selection and a fifth-round draft selection (provisionally No. 8 and 87)[12]
Corey Durdin	Central District	SANFL	AFL National Draft, second round selection (No. 37 overall)
Jack Carroll	East Fremantle	WAFL	AFL National Draft, second round selection (No. 41 overall)
Luke Parks	Glenelg	SANFL	AFL Rookie Draft, first round selection (No. 8 overall)

Out

Player	New Club	League	via
Matthew Kreuzer			Retired[13]
Kade Simpson			Retired[14]
Darcy Lang	Waratah[15]	NTFL	Delisted after the season[16]
Ben Silvagni	Sydney reserves[17]	VFL	Delisted after the season[16]
Finbar O'Dwyer			Delisted after the season[16]
Hugh Goddard			Delisted from the rookie list after the season[16]
Harrison Macreadie	Williamstown[18]	VFL	Delisted after the trade period[19]
Cameron Polson	Williamstown[18]	VFL	Delisted after the trade period[19]
Fraser Phillips			Delisted from the rookie list after the trade period[16]
Callum Moore			Delisted from the rookie list after the trade period,[16] but remained on the club's train-on list through the offseason.

List management

Player	Change
Michael Gibbons	Elevated from the rookie list to the senior list.[20]
Matthew Kennedy	Demoted from the senior list to the rookie list.[19]
Eddie Betts	Demoted from the senior list to the rookie list.[21]
Zavier Maher Oscar McDonald Callum Moore	All three players received permission to train with Carlton during the 2021 pre-season ahead of the supplemental selection period;[22]

Squad

Most significant among the list changes in the women's team for the 2021 season was the loss of foundation player Sarah Hosking to Richmond, and the acquisition of former Melbourne captain Elise O'Dea – both in trades.[23][24] The club's highest draft pick, No. 12, went to the recruitment of Mimi Hill.

The club's 2021 squad is given below.

Season

Carlton fielded reserves teams in the men's and women's competitions during the 2021 season.