No illusions for Richo
5:05:18 PM Fri 19 May, 2006
Mark Rasmussen
Sportal for afl.com.au
With Richmond sitting in 11th place with the competition's worst percentage, the Tigers will be up against it when they face ladder leader Adelaide this Saturday at Telstra Dome.
Speaking at a pre-match press conference on Friday, Tiger spearhead Matthew Richardson was under no illusions about the task ahead of his side.
"I think Adelaide are the form team of the competition. They have a very disciplined structure at the moment," he said.
"Obviously it was a disappointing result last week but there's no point sitting around all week worrying about that. You've just got to get straight back into it especially against Adelaide who are a premiership contender," Richardson said.
"We've just got to get back in there and be competitive again this week."
With injury concerns to several of Richmond's key players, the Tigers will be playing their first five draft choices from last year in Saturday's game. But even while players such as Darren Gaspar and Kane Johnson are recovering from injury, Richardson remains excited by the prospect of the new guys coming through.
"It's true you need your best players out there but we're looking at it the other way. We're really getting some games into the younger players. Tomorrow we've got our first five round draft picks from last year playing tomorrow.
"I guess we're taking that as a positive. You can look at it negatively saying, we've got senior players out or you can look at getting some games into the young guys as they're our future. We're pretty excited by that," Richardson said.
With Gaspar and Johnson to possibly return next week there looks to be better times ahead for the Tigers' faithful.
"I would think Darren (Gaspar) would definitely play next week. Obviously five weeks is a long time for a hamstring. I think he did everything well today and should come up next week.
"I think Kane (Johnson), this will be his third game out, which is pretty stock standard for a hamstring, so he should be right for next week as well."
"Andrew (Kellaway) is playing, so that gives us a little bit of experience into our backline. Obviously he's a great defender and we need him out there."
With everyone seemingly writing the Tigers off this weekend, Richardson is well aware the clash with the Crows will be difficult.
"We've got nothing to lose. It's an old cliché but it's true. We've just got to get out there tomorrow and as I said, we're a young side. We've just got to make sure we're competitive and well, you just never know, the result might come our way," he said.
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