History, passion and Lygon Street: Carlton supporters look past former glories to find new hope

When the Donnini and Silvagni families arrived in Melbourne from Italy, they both settled on Canning Street in Carlton.

While Marco Donnini’s family became restaurateurs, the Silvagnis became synonymous with the Carlton Football Club, where three generations would play.

Jack Silvagni is not named to play in the Blues’ semi-final against Melbourne on Friday night, but he is perhaps the embodiment of the club’s connection to Italian migrants.

Donnini counts him among his favourites for this reason, and also because he represents the new Carlton: a team of role players, who work hard.

It is a notable change for a club that prides itself on its champion players, so much so that it sings about them in its theme song after every win.

“It’s interesting that so many people’s favourite players now are the hardest-working players,” Donnini says, while sitting outside his Lygon Street restaurant.

Donnini reckons that work rate has been fostered by coach Michael Voss – a champion former player who won three premierships with the Brisbane Lions.

Sergio Silvagni grew up in Canning Street, Carlton. He was the first of three generations to represent Carlton, followed by son Stephen and grandson Jack. Photograph: Abigail Varney/The Guardian

At times this season, Voss seemed set to go the way of many other recent Carlton coaches: set upon by an impatient supporter base, longing for glories past.

They have not won a premiership since 1995. It has been a decade since the club was last in the finals. But, along with Essendon, it has won a record 16 premierships during its history.

One of those recently departed former coaches, Mick Malthouse, once said of Collingwood – another club that appointed him to return it to glory – that it never looked behind. It preferred instead to look through a “big open windscreen”. He took them to a premiership.

At Carlton, the car was different. Instead of a big windscreen, Malthouse said, there was a “rear-view mirror [that was] too big for modern football”. He was sacked after 54 games.

But Donnini feels that something is different. He says Voss has worked hard to foster relationships with his players that mean that when he speaks, they listen. It could be enough to drown out the often unbearable echoes of history bouncing around the Princes Park grandstands.

“We have 40-something impressionable young there who don’t need the fluff. They need the truth,” he says.

Donnini’s is the club’s family restaurant, meaning it hosts functions for players, the administration and the board throughout the season.

“They treat us as friends, and we treat them like family,” Donnini says.

Ikon Park, also known as Princes Park, is the traditional home ground for Carlton. It now serves as the training and administration base, and the AFLW and men’s reserves home ground. Photograph: Abigail Varney/The Guardian

The club endeavours to enmesh itself with Lygon Street, he says, knowing that the street and the suburb are a vital part of its identity.

And he reckons the uplift in the club’s fortunes have also provided a boost to the street, which has also had a troubled decade, capped by the challenges of the pandemic.

“The club, but also the suburb and the street, have been a bit flat for a while,” he says.

He is embracing the excitement. He remembers having to turn off the television in previous Septembers while other teams triumphed, and now smiles at fathers walking with their sons in Carlton gear, as Donnini does with his four boys.

Up from Donnini’s, on the opposite side of the street, Manu Sahni has several flags on the counter of his business, Carlton Newsagency.

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Just as the Donninis and Silvagnis settled in Carlton decades ago and soon decided to become involved with the club, so did Sahni when he arrived from India in the early 2000s.

On the day he arrived in Melbourne from Rajasthan, he went straight to his new job in the newsagent. Within a year, he says he realised that becoming involved in the Carlton Football Club was a good way to “assimilate” into the community.

He found a measure of fame over the following decade after he featured in Street Talk, a popular segment on the now defunct the Footy Show.

When the Blues last played finals, the club posted a photo of Sahni on its official Facebook page. He was dressed in full Carlton regalia, including novelty headwear, standing on the middle of Lygon Street with a large homemade sign that read #DEFINITELYBELIEVE.

Manu Sahni at Carlton Newsagency on Lygon Street. He’s seen enough in this team that makes him think they could win the club’s 17th flag. Photograph: Abigail Varney/The Guardian

That quest finished at a semi-final, the same do-or-die stage that the Blues are playing on Friday night, but Sahni has seen enough in this team that makes him think they could win the club’s 17th flag.

“It is great they have tasted blood,” Sahni says.

“They will be hungry for it again next year.”

Princes Park, where Carlton’s men’s team no longer play competitively, but where the club is based, is a few dozen solid torpedo punts north-east of the newsagency.

Peter Hughes is taking photos on his phone outside the ground, clutching a shopping bag from the club’s merchandise shop.

He travelled from Hobart for the game, and has bought a new Carlton guernsey and a jumper, as his other gear was looking a little worn.

Peter Hughes from Hobart, who has followed Carlton since 1965, picks up a new guernsey at Ikon Park’s Carlton Shop ahead of the final. Photograph: Abigail Varney/The Guardian

As it well might; Hughes has followed Carlton since 1965, changing his allegiances from Melbourne as a nine-year-old, when Ron Barassi switched clubs.

“That was a good decision,” he says.

“Melbourne has only one premiership since, and Carlton have won heaps [eight, to be precise]”.

Hughes has seen the 1979, 1981 and 1982 flags in person, and reckons another isn’t far off, though maybe not this year.

“Melbourne are my second team, so I usually don’t mind if they win,” he says.

“But not this time.”