Ins
Taylor Hunt, Corey Ellis, Connor Menadue, Nathan Drummond, Daniel Butler, Reece McKenzie, Jayden Short (rk), Jason Castagna (rk), Kane Lambert (rk), Matt Arnot (rk), Ivan Soldo (rk)
Outs
Daniel Jackson, Jake King, Matt Arnot, Aaron Edwards, Brad Helbig, Brett O’Hanlon, Orren Stephenson, Todd Banfield, Ben Darrou, Cadeyn Williams
My prediction
A lot was said about the way the Tigers finished off last season. Nine wins in a row to scrape into the finals is a terrific accomplishment but on balance I don’t think their finishing in the 8 is a reflection of their year. At the halfway mark it looked like Hardwick would be applying for an assistant’s job at EFC this year. It was a great turnaround. Then Port reminded us how far Richmond actually have to go.
I believe Richmond struggle with the depth of its list. There is such a big gap between their best players and the rest that too much work is left to too few. If you were to judge the team by the bottom 6 players in their best 22 then Richmond is not a finals contender. Fortunately for them they have some genuinely great players who get the job done regularly.
A lot went right last year for them to make the finals and they will need a lot to go right for them to repeat that performance. Someone has to drop out of the eight for the GC to move in. Richmond are the logical choice for mine just because they didn’t have a top 8 forward line or a top 8 defence.
I reckon their leadership (on and off field) is really pox. I don’t see the guy like Jobe or Goddard who you’d just ask ‘how high?’.
I see Newman, Deledio and Cotchin all as more or less like Stanton - they do their job, they set a good example, they prepare well and acquit themselves well but they’re quiet personalities, they’re not confident in themselves, and not exactly inspiring. Good leadership group material but not guys who scream out as captains.
Even under Knights, when we basically sucked, we had guys who - although they weren’t necessarily great players (Hille, Spike, Lloyd and Welsh), were demanding, competitive leaders.
IMHO the Tigs list actually has a pretty good shape to it IMHO in terms of distribution over ages and they’ve invested a bunch of picks in young talls which is a smart move over the medium to long term. I could see another coach taking over and making it all click pretty quickly. They just need one or two more really hard edged midfielders, and a foot up the ■■■■.
I reckon their leadership (on and off field) is really pox. I don’t see the guy like Jobe or Goddard who you’d just ask ‘how high?’.
I see Newman, Deledio and Cotchin all as more or less like Stanton - they do their job, they set a good example, they prepare well and acquit themselves well but they’re quiet personalities, they’re not confident in themselves, and not exactly inspiring. Good leadership group material but not guys who scream out as captains.
Even under Knights, when we basically sucked, we had guys who - although they weren’t necessarily great players (Hille, Spike, Lloyd and Welsh), were demanding, competitive leaders.
IMHO the Tigs list actually has a pretty good shape to it in terms of distribution over ages and they’ve invested a bunch of picks in young talls. Might not do much for them in the here and now but it’s normally a smart move over the medium to long term. I could see another coach taking over and making it all click pretty quickly. They just need one or two more really hard edged midfielders - and a foot up the ■■■■.
Tigers have had an incredibly lucky run with injury for quite a while now. Other than GC/Ablett I can't think of a side that;s so reliant on such a small group of players. Cotchin, Deledio, Martin, Riewoldt, Rance, Maric. Grigg and Houli can front-run and Ellis is ok, but the rest are pretty much rubbish and have been for years. But that core group of theirs is just so resilient year in, year out, and misses so few games to injury they've managed to kid themselves that they have a decent size. But when a couple of them DO get injured or drop form - Deledio is out now, for the first time in aaaages, and Cotchin isn't playing well, my god they fall apart fast. They'd never have coped with the sort of injury toll we've had over the past cople of years. We basically broke even last year with Jobe out for 7 weeks or whatever it was. Tigers just would dissolve into a puddle if they missed Cotchin for that long. Their depth is just rubbish.
HM, what do you make of Hardwick as a coach?
I would imagine he’d be under a lot of pressure if they miss the 8 this year, which is highly likely IMO. But he’s contracted for a few more years isn’t he?
Dunno about his contract status, but he could very well be feeling the heat towards the end of the year. So far only malthouse is saving him, both by being a more obvious target for the journalism vultures, and by losing to him in round 1.
What really strikes me is how poor their development has been, of talls especially. Where’s Elton? Vickery never quite got it together. They had to poach Chaplin. Griffiths is more than a bit meh. McBean should be playing right now, as a roaming tall chf in the Kepler mould to take some heat off riewoldt, but he’s playing mediocre vfl instead. Even the smaller guys - why isn’t Lennon playing? What the hell happened to Conca - even though they clearly should have picked heppell, Conca at least should be playing solid footy by now. The only good new players they’ve had for a few years now are Chaplin and Miles, neither if who came through the Richmond development program. Reminds me of us circa 2005, where keps, laycock, Harvey, bullen were going to step up Any Time Now, Real Soon, You’ll See.
Most of these guys (except Griffiths) were blokes I rated as juniors. I think they’ve drafted pretty well (I may simply have evaluated these blokes wrong of course!), but talent just doesn’t kick on there. Whether that’s all attributable to Hardwick I dunno, but there’s some undeniable structural off-field problems down punt road way.
Barrett (shudder) just said on TFS that Rance is a chance of retiring at seasons end to pursue other interests.
I would think there is little chance that this is true.
But how glorious it would be, Richmond would get NOTHING for (arugably) their best player leaving the club!
Old mate Purple has a hit-miss ratio that makes the dubious musings of More Mayo, Wilthon and Fatpr1ck seem truly credible. Please don’t ever make the mistake of reporting ANYTHING that damp squib has to say as factual.
Compared to their stream of excrement they’ve had, he is a master coach.
Geischen, Walls, Bartlett, Frawley & Wallet.
And those are just the ones off the top of my head.
Since 1980, the last time they were any good, they’ve had one coach who I’d say was something more than retarded.
John Northey.
The rest of them were either finished as coaches and a sign of their desperation to get somewhere, or blokes with no idea what to do.
There’s a stat floating around that without Deedio, in the past 5 years, they’re 1-5 or something. Can you imagine if Jobe had only missed 6 games in 5 years?
Similarly Maric has only missed a small handful, Jack, Martin, Cotchin etc.
HM’s right about having a charmed run. Freakish.
They seem to be happy treading water as long as their membership numbers are up. Club (not to mention supporters) seem to think Dimma is a master coach. He’s not terrible but I can’t think of any other coach who’s got 6 years without winning a final, and certainly not 7.
Tigers have had an incredibly lucky run with injury for quite a while now. Other than GC/Ablett I can't think of a side that;s so reliant on such a small group of players. Cotchin, Deledio, Martin, Riewoldt, Rance, Maric. Grigg and Houli can front-run and Ellis is ok, but the rest are pretty much rubbish and have been for years. But that core group of theirs is just so resilient year in, year out, and misses so few games to injury they've managed to kid themselves that they have a decent size. But when a couple of them DO get injured or drop form - Deledio is out now, for the first time in aaaages, and Cotchin isn't playing well, my god they fall apart fast. They'd never have coped with the sort of injury toll we've had over the past cople of years. We basically broke even last year with Jobe out for 7 weeks or whatever it was. Tigers just would dissolve into a puddle if they missed Cotchin for that long. Their depth is just rubbish.
HM, what do you make of Hardwick as a coach?
I would imagine he’d be under a lot of pressure if they miss the 8 this year, which is highly likely IMO. But he’s contracted for a few more years isn’t he?
Contracts mean nothing these days as we full well know.
He’ll be gone at the end of the season if they don’t improve on last year. It is hardly his fault because he can only work with what he is given but they are a ■■■■■■ ordinary team on a good day.
Tigers have had an incredibly lucky run with injury for quite a while now. Other than GC/Ablett I can't think of a side that;s so reliant on such a small group of players. Cotchin, Deledio, Martin, Riewoldt, Rance, Maric. Grigg and Houli can front-run and Ellis is ok, but the rest are pretty much rubbish and have been for years. But that core group of theirs is just so resilient year in, year out, and misses so few games to injury they've managed to kid themselves that they have a decent size. But when a couple of them DO get injured or drop form - Deledio is out now, for the first time in aaaages, and Cotchin isn't playing well, my god they fall apart fast. They'd never have coped with the sort of injury toll we've had over the past cople of years. We basically broke even last year with Jobe out for 7 weeks or whatever it was. Tigers just would dissolve into a puddle if they missed Cotchin for that long. Their depth is just rubbish.
HM, what do you make of Hardwick as a coach?
I would imagine he’d be under a lot of pressure if they miss the 8 this year, which is highly likely IMO. But he’s contracted for a few more years isn’t he?
Tigers have had an incredibly lucky run with injury for quite a while now. Other than GC/Ablett I can’t think of a side that;s so reliant on such a small group of players. Cotchin, Deledio, Martin, Riewoldt, Rance, Maric. Grigg and Houli can front-run and Ellis is ok, but the rest are pretty much rubbish and have been for years. But that core group of theirs is just so resilient year in, year out, and misses so few games to injury they’ve managed to kid themselves that they have a decent side. But when a couple of them DO get injured or drop form - Deledio is out now, for the first time in aaaages, and Cotchin isn’t playing well, my god they fall apart fast. They’d never have coped with the sort of injury toll we’ve had over the past cople of years. We basically broke even last year with Jobe out for 7 weeks or whatever it was. Tigers just would dissolve into a puddle if they missed Cotchin for that long. Their depth is just rubbish.
In 2014 the Tiger train got up a head of steam, but it didnt just suffer a derailment at the end, it was a full on train crash in the first quarter at he end of the line.
Maric, Martin Cochin Rance and Riewolt are the Tiges. Beyond that they dont bat deep. Tbh, I would be amazed if they finish higher than us this year.
Yep spot on, they’ve got the makings of a Carlton list. Picked up a few good players early in the drafts a few yrs ago but picked up no one in the latter picks. While the stars are young & playing well, they will continue to finish anywhere between 6-10, once stars drop away a little there’s nothing else coming through apart from recycled players.
Midfield relies on 2-3 players, forward line relies on 1-2 players, Maric is an overrated unco hack & not much else coming thru in the ruck, defence relies on Rance.