A third straight win has strengthened Carlton's once-faltering AFL finals claims but Mick Malthouse has warned the wayward Blues must clean up their act in front of goal.
Malthouse labelled his side's conversion rate as "terrible" after the Blues finally shook off Gold Coast with a final-quarter spree for a 43-point victory on Saturday.
Smashing the injury-hampered Suns at the stoppages, Carlton kicked 16.24 (120) to 11.11 (77) at Metricon Stadium for the hosts to stay in the contest far longer than they deserved.
The inaccuracy was highlighted by a wasteful 2.9 return for their third-quarter dominance.
A loss by Port Adelaide to Brisbane on Sunday would see Carlton slip back into the top eight with five rounds to play, but Malthouse stressed a repeat up forward would be punished in big games come September, or before.
"We were really off," the Blues coach said. "We kicked multiple points and I don't know if that's a contagious thing.
"Contagious things on a football field are generally more mind than anything else. We see one miss, we tighten up, we miss a second, all of a sudden a third.
"We've got to overcome that."
Malthouse noted accuracy was an issue before the trip north and hoped the rest of his team could follow the lead of Brock McLean who overcame a glaring miss in last week's one-point win over the Kangaroos to make two shots count on Saturday.
It was Carlton's midfield dominance, winning the clearances 41 to 29, which set the platform with ruckman Matthew Kreuzer (41 hit-outs) superb and Heath Scotland sharing a game-high 32 possessions.
In his much-hyped 248th senior game, equalling the number of his father, Gary Ablett also ended with 32 touches but was relatively well contained by a niggling Ed Kurnow.
Ablett was still among the Coast's best, with returning key forward Charlie Dixon, but was nowhere near as damaging as he was in last week's upset of Collingwood.
The Blues jumped to a 26-point lead after just 10 minutes but couldn't shake the Suns until early in the final quarter when Lachie Henderson kicked two quick goals to finish with four for the match.
"It was effective to win, but far from our best footy," Malthouse said.
Gold Coast sorely missed late withdrawals Dion Prestia (knee) and Rory Thompson (ankle), and then suffered further when ruckman Tom Nicholls' was subbed out just after halftime when two goals separated the sides.
Nicholls' injury forced Dixon, until then highly effective as the sole target up forward in his long-awaited return, to shoulder the load in the ruck and took away their prime key target.
"(Dixon's) ability to take contested marks ... that's probably why we were as competitive as we were but then him going into the ruck all of a sudden saw us go back to square one again," lamented Suns coach Guy McKenna.
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