Carlton’s on-field woes have been well and truly documented this year, but damning vision of their second-half performance against St Kilda has now put the club’s decorated leaders firmly in the gun.

At the top of that list is captain and dual Brownlow medallist Patrick Cripps, with former Blues and Collingwood star Dale Thomas highlighting an effort from the skipper late in the third term that resulted in the ball being walked out of Carlton’s defence and resulting in a St Kilda score.

WATCH THE VIDEO ABOVE: Damning vision exposes Carlton leaders

“(Call it) ‘the Carlton cliff’ that is now coming at half-time or there beyond for their games,” Thomas said, while running vision of the final 20 seconds of the third quarter,” Thomas said on Channel 7’s The Agenda Setters.

“The skipper Patty Cripps has the ball, so you’d imagine they’re the only team that can score. So what you need is some leadership behind the footy. You need to go and address a man ... try and find a man.”

Cripps boots the ball forward and stands in the middle of the ground as the St Kilda players spread.

“Just watch where Patty Cripps and his direct opponent have gone there,” Thomas said.

Cripps stands in the middle while his opponent, Jack Macrae, heads out to the wing. St Kilda win the ball and then run it out via the wing, resulting in a shot on goal for Cooper Sharman.

St Kilda booted eight goals in the third term, to Carlton’s one, in an all too familiar pattern.

“So is it now becoming players? Is it becoming the coach? Is it just a defeatist mindset? Because even with plus two (in defence), you’ve got (Zac) Williams through the middle there. These are senior players. You’ve got (vice-captain Jacob) Weitering who’s sliding across, (Nick) Haynes as well, players who are not going out there and complying with the game plan.

“They know what they should be doing, but at times it just simply isn’t happening. So whether or not this cliff comes and we all see it across the field, the heads start to drop.

“They gave up 8.4 in that third quarter.”

AFL expert Kane Cornes stressed that the vision was late in third term, and the ball was deep in Carlton’s forward line.

“And it’s gone up the other end for a score within the space of 20 seconds. It’s hard to watch,” Thomas said.

Thomas said young Carlton players would be “scratching their heads”.

“If they’re senior players, Crippa, Weitering, (Adam) Saad, Williams, Haynes involved there, what are you trying to sell to the younger brigade? It’s tough watching at the minute,” he said.

AFL great Luke Hodge was also critical of Cripps and Weitering for not attempting to get in the face of — or get physical with — former teammate Tom De Koning.

“These guys left for either more coin or more of a chance of success. The only time that De Koning got touched in the first minute was (accidental contact) from Harry Dean,” Hodge said.

“And then, what got me afterwards, he’s running back after the first minute ... they’ve had a goal kicked against them. Weitering’s looking at the ground, doesn’t even look at Tom De Koning.

“This is a person who left your football club to go and have success at another football club. At least get into it.

“Patty Cripps is standing right beside him (at the stoppage). That is a big target ... Even if you’re not going to win the game, you can have the motivation there to try and have a team target.

“Go in there as a collective group. For the next 120 minutes, think we’re going to make his life absolute hell, knowing that whenever he comes up against his former team, that he’s going to have 120 minutes of torture, of physicality, of making sure he’s going to regret that decision.”

Like his team, Cripps has not had a great start to 2026, and had a disappointing game against the Saints, managing just 14 disposals.

Hodge compared Carlton to ladder leader Sydney, who, when they played Melbourne on Sunday, made Demons champion Max Gawn a target.

He ran vision of Nick Blakey, Justin McInerney, Isaac Heeney, Dane Rampe, and Tom Papley all getting into Gawn early in the game.

“That’s all in the first minute 20 of that game. Five different players from the Sydney Swans went and hit into Gawn because he was a team target.,” Hodge said.

“It was a little commitment that they were going to make.

“So compare that mindset to the Carlton Football Club, who were coming up against a mate, a former colleague, but someone who ultimately left that football club. They did not want one bar of it.

“So that’s where you sit back and go, where’s the passion? Where’s the competitive spirit from these guys?”

Thomas said Carlton was a team “that’s worried about self”.

“I feel for the Blues, it has become all too big. And understandably, it must suck going out there when you can’t finish off games,” he said.

“If you can do little things like that, it’s amazing how quickly that goes across the ground. And it can be the difference in winning and losing.”