Carlton coach Michael Voss has questioned a decision which overruled a Blues goal in the final quarter of their eventual loss to Richmond on Thursday night.
Jack Newnes snapped cleverly from the forward pocket in the 19th-minute mark to bring the barnstorming Blues within three points of the Tigers at the MCG.
It came on the back of three straight Harry McKay goals which had eaten into the Tigers’ last-quarter 27-point lead.
Richmond defender Nathan Broad appealed immediately with the decision being sent to the ARC review system, which determined it had been touched.
The overruling of the goal had the Tigers in front by eight points and changed the momentum of the game.
It prompted Voss to wonder what could have been.
“If we’re going to make decisions like that in games, you’d hope it was definitive,” Voss said post-match.
“Certainly we’d want to make sure we’re absolutely 100 per cent sure before overturning something like that myself. Clearly the call was made and we have to live with the result.
“It didn’t look it (touched) from where I was but I don’t watch the 10 different angles of it.
“I’ve got one... if it was touched we move on.”
Nonetheless, the decision was made and the Blues lost by 15 points.
They found themselves trailing by six goals in the first half, which proved a bridge too far and was Voss’ greatest lament.
“The game was set up really early,” Voss added.
“We certainly overused the ball early. Not how we wanted to come into the game, especially with the conditions.
“When you factor in the opposition and the way they’re able to play, we just fuelled their game too much.
“What I wasn’t expecting was their dominance around the ball early in the game, so we did well to try and fight our way out of those positions, (but) sometimes it’s just a weight or numbers.
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“76 inside 50s, that’s pretty big. We certainly weren’t expecting that sort of number.
“We fought our way back, there’s a positive, absolutely. We keep fighting right to the end, we never give in, but at the start of the game we couldn’t quite execute the way we wanted to.”
It doesn’t get any easier for the fourth-placed Blues who own a 9-4 record.
They host third-placed Fremantle at Marvel Stadium next Saturday before taking on the sixth-placed St Kilda in Round 15.