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Find your frequency hereWhy Weitering is confident Blues can still play finals in 2025
Louis Van Dam • June 8th, 2025 3:45 pm
After an underwhelming start to 2025 for Carlton, star defender Jacob Weitering has elaborated on how his club has reviewed the season so far in looking for improvement to save their season.
Currently 13th on the ladder with a 4-7 record after a disappointing start, speculation has risen as to whether the Blues can make a realistic push for finals or if they should look at a reset.
Weitering admits that things need to improve.
“We haven’t had the best start to the year and that’s something that we’ve got to go to work on,” Weitering told SEN’s Whateley.
“Naturally, you tend to look at the negatives pretty quickly, and for us the positives are pretty stark.”
Carlton have promising indicators this year, providing plenty of pressure on the ball to be ranked second in tackling and tackles inside 50, third in intercepts, fourth in clearances while being first in stoppage clearances, fifth for inside 50s, first in contested marks and first in contested possessions.
“The KPIs in behind our defence at the moment are really positive and we’ve got a pretty set backline as well,” Weitering added.
“We’re an incredibly good contested side so we’re winning the battle for clearances.
“Going inside 50 as well, the numbers stack up, I think our inside 50 differential is around number three in the comp.
“We’re certainly getting supply into our forwards, and then it’s just going to be that execution piece, and that’s just not on the forwards it’s how we’re getting it in there.”
The Blue have proven they can get the ball forward, but the factors jeopardising them the most include being last in the league for disposal efficiency, shot at goal efficiency, 14th for shots on goal, eighth for turnovers and 16th for rebound inside 50s.
Weitering knows that balancing their best traits and the areas of improvement will go a long way to improving results.
“If we can sort of close the gap in between our worst and our best, it’s going to put us in a really good position to win more games than not,” Weitering continued.
“There’ll be a little bit of both (change and refinement), it’s nothing new to us the way we move the ball, it’s probably the confidence to take some of those kicks as well.
“For us, there’s a bit of freedom and embracing that imperfection with our skills.”
Weitering is currently averaging 14.7 disposals, 7.7 marks, 5.2 spoils and has impressively had his lowest contested defensive losses so far in his career.
He knows what it takes to defend solidly, but what does the team as a whole need to do to set the tone?
“We talked about front-half turnovers being a really big KPI for most AFL teams,” he said further.
“We’re playing a little bit in our back half at the moment, I’d like to be up the front half and moving the ball inside 50.”
His teammate and star ruckman Tom De Koning has been involved in ongoing trade talk and speculation with St Kilda in pursuit of his services.
Weitering says the added uncertainty has not necessarily affected the team’s attitude.
“Every player at every club goes through it,” continued Weitering.
“He’s (De Koning) a very exciting player and very critical to what we do as a team.”
“We’ve just got to keep backing him in and treating him the same, maybe a few jokes thrown in there of course, you want to make it as organic and natural as possible and less awkward.”
As they've done in the recent past, the Blues are planning to play their best footy in the second half of the campaign as they strive to play finals again.
“We tend to hit our straps when we’ve had these sorts of breaks,” said the vice-captain.
“We’re in a different situation (to 2023), it’s a different year, our profile is a little bit different, the players that are out there are a little bit different.
“We are getting a little bit healthier which is really good.”
“I’ve got great confidence in our ability from top down and the leadership, the coaches, and the way our game plan is structured up to go forward and win games and I think we’ve shown a little bit of that but just not consistently enough this year.
“There’s a team and a core that can certainly do that (repeat the 2023 run).
“We’ve got a job to do as players, and hopefully we can execute and bring some success towards the back end and have some more positive conversations.”
Carlton next faces Essendon at the MCG in the King's Birthday eve blockbuster on Sunday night.
