MICHAEL Voss says Thursday night's match against Carlton is the perfect chance to start changing perceptions of his Brisbane Lions.
After a disastrous two seasons that have netted a combined total of 11 wins, the Lions kicked off 2012 in stunning fashion last Saturday with a 41-point hiding of Melbourne.
Most of the post-match analysis was on how poor the Demons were rather than the improvement of the Lions.
But Lions coach Voss insisted his team had not earned the right to be praised yet, andplaying the Blues gave them a great opportunity to measure themselves against one of the AFL's best.
"I keep using that word 'opportunity', but we're playing a side that's been up and about for a couple of years now, in particular last year, and we're in front of a national audience, so I can think of no better stage to be able to try and change people's views of us," he said.
"People don't know what we're about yet and we've got to go about showing people what we do stand for and what type of footy we want to play."
Voss was full of praise for Carlton, which is coming off a comfortable 44-point win over Richmond.
He said the main area of concern for his team was curtailing the Blues midfield led by Chris Judd and Marc Murphy.
The Lions have tried to expand their own engine room over the past season, with Claye Beams, Jared Polec and Pearce Hanley joining the established rotation of Simon Black, Tom Rockliff, Jack Redden and Daniel Rich.
"They've got a few players they can whack through there; they're not reliant on a couple," Voss said.
"We know what influence Chris Judd has but there's a few others that are fair support acts if you want to call them that, because they're probably a fair bit more than that. We have to attack it as a group.
"I think they (Judd and Murphy) complement each other pretty well. Chris Judd is a proven winner and Murphy has been pretty important to them too. To separate them at the moment is pretty hard because Murphy is having a huge influence on games, but you take your eye off Chris Judd and he can do some damage."
Voss said the five-day turnaround was of no concern to the Lions.
He said having it so early in the season was a blessing as it allowed them to quickly move on from the round one win and get their teeth stuck into round two.
Voss said the entire Lions team had recovered well from the Melbourne match and would hold a closed training session at the Gabba on Wednesday afternoon.
Michael Whiting covers Brisbane Lions news for AFL.com.au. Follow him on Twitter: @AFL_mikewhiting
