‘Position is clear’: Blues’ emphatic call on rival Curnow bids as midfielder on trade table

Blues coach Michael Voss says the club won’t listen to trade offers for Charlie Curnow, declaring the star forward will “be at Carlton in 2026.”

Reports last week stated Curnow requested a trade at his exit interview, despite being contracted at Ikon Park until 2029, after speculation first emerged two months ago that the dual Coleman medallist was considering his future.

It makes Curnow one of the biggest names to watch in the lead into next month’s trade period, with Sydney and Geelong seen as the most likely landing spots.

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But Voss played down Curnow’s trade request, saying (being) “open” to a move was “more the language used”.

“And obviously from our position it was pretty clear. So we don’t feel like we’re in that position to go down that path. That position was well and truly communicated back to him,” Voss said on SEN radio.

“From that point on we moved on to other topics and talked about his year and how we can get him better and get him back to that striking form he had only 12 months ago.”

Asked if they would answer the phone to listen to Curnow offers, Voss responded: “No.

“Our position is pretty clear. It’s been stated — I don’t even know publicly whether we’ve said anything — but he’ll be at Carlton in 2026.

“Those discussions — if there are any others — will continue behind closed doors.

“He’s a two-time Coleman medallist, it could have been three, who has four years to run on a contract. We feel like he’s an incredibly important person to us.

“He’ll figure for us moving forward and hopefully he’s playing out the rest of his career here.”

Voss wasn’t willing to disclose the reasons behind Curnow’s concerns. But the Blues coach noted it’d been a “challenging year” for the 28-year old as part of the wider club’s struggles as Carlton fell well short of finals.

“I don’t think it’s worthy of going into detail outside of that we’ve had a tough year, he’s had a challenging year,” Voss said.

“He’s obviously had three surgeries over the course of this year.

“It’s just been a tough year and we’ve all felt that and I imagine our players have felt that as well. We’re all pretty determined to change that.”

Voss confirmed the club had asked Elijah Hollands to explore his trade options with a year to run on his contract after being “disappointed” with off-field concerns.

That included Hollands, 23, being limited to five senior games due to personal leave.

“That discussion was: ‘It’s up to you to look around and find out if another place suits you’,” the Carlton boss continued.

“He’s clear on where we stand with that, so it’s up to him to go explore those options and what they look like.

“Absolutely, we have been a little bit disappointed with how it has transpired across the year.

“He’s been quite an important player to us and over the course of the previous year he had a real influence on the way we played. But the year hasn’t gone the way we wanted with ‘Lij’ and the conversation was” ‘If there is another place which will get the best out of you, mate, this is the time to go look for that’.”

Meanwhile, Voss held no ill feelings towards departing free agents Tom De Koning and Jack Silvagni.

“Of course whenever players come to you and say they want to leave, it’s a tough one to accept. But at the same time, you’ve got to take the factors into consideration,” he added.

“(De Koning and Silvagni) are free agents, so they’re there to be able to explore their options.

“Let’s wait and see and what the total offer is for Tom, but I reckon that’s a pretty compelling offer! It’s hard not to look at.

“We don’t begrudge the young man being able to take the opportunity, it’s a rare one you get and obviously he’s chosen to take it.

“We don’t just look at it as two players, it’s the density of people we have. It’s the environment – whether that’s staff or the playing group – we take our feedback from as well.

“The feedback we get is, while we’re not perfect and know we need to improve and clearly we’re not where we need to be, in terms of our environment and getting the best out of people, we feel like we’ve got the environment to be able to do that.

“Charlie is a two-time Coleman medallist. Patrick Cripps is a dual Brownlow medallist. We talk about the environment and getting the best out of people, I would say the results say so.

“But this year it’s been particularly challenging.”