CARLTON coach Michael Voss believes that play should have stopped after a collision between Blues defender Lachie Cowan and a field umpire led to a Brisbane goal during the first quarter of Thursday night's match.

Cowan ran into the back of the umpire as he was running for a mark, with the ball spilling out to Cam Rayner, who handballed to an open Charlie Cameron for an easy goal.

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Asked whether he thought the umpires should have called for a ball-up, Voss replied: "Yeah, absolutely."

"You couldn't ask me what the ruling is on that, sorry. Other than if you're interrupting the passage of play, I would have thought it's common sense to make that a ball-up. It didn't cost the game, so we move on.

"But if there's an adjustment that I'd be suggesting, I'd say that if your general interference in the play and the direct line of the ball, then, yeah, I would have thought the common sense thing to do there is to ball that up.

"So maybe that's something they need to make an adjustment on in the future if there's a different interpretation on that."

Brisbane coach Chris Fagan saw the irony in the incident considering that umpire contact has been a point of discussion lately since the AFL changed the rules regarding umpire contact at the start of this month.

"It's funny in footy how suddenly something becomes a topic and then things keep happening to keep it going as a topic," Fagan said.

"We've got to look after the umpires and protect the umpires, but sometimes accidents happen, which I figure that was an accident tonight. But I think the things that the AFL are talking about that we've now put in place, I think they're good."

Fagan provided further detail on the severity of the injury to premiership defender Noah Answerth who was subbed out of the game in the second quarter.

"Yeah, it's a bad injury. I think he's ruptured his Achilles," he said.

"I'm no medical expert but I think they're usually around about a nine-month recovery from surgery, which is such a pity. He was playing very well, terrific game I thought.

"He's one of the more popular members of our team. He's the ultimate team player and we're all very, very disappointed for him.

"He was a really important part of our premiership team last year. He's just one of those blokes who will do anything for you, so we'll all be a bit flat about that."

Carlton suffered injuries of its own with livewire forward Orazio Fantasia subbed out of the game with a hamstring problem and swingman Mitch McGovern coming to the bench later in the game with hamstring awareness.

"He (McGovern) had some awareness, but it was like in the last five minutes. So it was probably more just, you know, what's the point of putting him back out there?" Voss said.

"So we're more cautious. But like all these, I always tend to hold that opinion until we get the scans back on Monday."

Star ruckman Tom De Koning spent most of the night playing as the Blues' deepest forward, limiting his impact on the game.

The in-demand tall finished with 14 disposals and a goal, while fellow ruck Marc Pittonet spent most of the time in the middle finishing the game with 35 hitouts to De Koning’s 10.

Voss was asked whether fans should read into the Pittonet being the preferred ruck considering De Koning’s future at the Blues is uncertain, with the tall weighing up a huge offer from St Kilda.

"No, it's pretty black and white for us. I think you read well and truly too much into it. So I don't tend to play in that sort of area. We need a role filled forward of the ball at the moment," Voss said.

"We're challenged with some talls right now and Pitto's in great form, so he deserves to be in the team. So we need some tall timber forward of the ball that can draw the footy.

"There's a need to have Tom there at the moment. So that's the role we're asking him to play. Just make it black and white. You don't need to read into it too much more than that."