Hardwick's defensive pressure & puts heat on Tiger mids (afl & Sportal)

[one-eyed]

Hardwick's defensive pressure
By Jason Phelan
5:41 PM Thu 19 May, 2011


RICHMOND coach Damien Hardwick has demanded a strong defensive effort from his team against Essendon in Saturday night's Dreamtime at the 'G match.

The Tigers lost a shootout against the Western Bulldogs 23.15 to 18.10 last weekend, which is not the sort of football that will see the club return to the finals according to the coach.

"It's not often you give away 150 points and expect to win a footy game," Hardwick said from Punt Road Oval on Thursday.

"We were poor in a number of areas last week, but that was probably the one thing [that concerned me most]. We gave up far too many easy goals. There were some reasons for that and we've tried to rectify those.  

"The funny thing about defence though is that it's a mindset more than anything else. How quickly you flick from offence to defence is genuinely how good you become as a side.

"I know the fans might want to see it, but I don't want to see us kick 20 goals each game. I'd rather see 15 goals each game that comes down to a solid arm wrestle - that's what we want to be about and that's what finals footy is about."

Hardwick has made three changes to the side to face the Bombers with Shane Tuck, Andrew Browne and Mitch Farmer coming in for the injured Shane Edwards (cheekbone) and Angus Graham and Ben Nason, who were both dropped.

Although Hardwick isn't expecting a high-scoring affair, he is looking forward to assessing how his charges react to the big stage of the annual fixture that honours the contribution of indigenous footballers to the game.

"It's an exciting game for us," he said.

"With our recent history, we haven't had an opportunity to play in these big games and for us, it is a finals-like environment and a finals-like atmosphere.

"Our guys are fully-charged and hopefully they're ready to go. They've had a good week on the training track … we were disappointed with last week and we look to rectify that this week."

The club will wear specially-designed guernseys for the clash, with Hardwick branding criticism of the decision to change the famous yellow sash as "ill-informed".

Richmond will not have any indigenous players in its team for the clash, but Hardwick revealed the club has not given up hope of luring Troy Taylor back from the Northern Territory.

The Tigers are in fortnightly contact with the talented midfielder and have applied to the AFL to allow him to play with NT Thunder in a bid to motivate him to return to the club.

Hardwick also revealed that Kel Moore had suffered complications with the injured hip he had surgery on in the off-season.

Further surgery or extended rest were the options presented to the club with the medical staff preferring to go with the less invasive option, which saw him put on the long-term injury list.

His addition to that list means he must miss at least eight weeks of football, but the coach remains hopeful the important defender will be back training in three to four weeks.

http://www.afl.com.au/news/newsarticle/tabid/208/newsid/114313/default.aspx

[one-eyed]

Heat on Tigers mids
19/05/2011
Angus Morgan
Sportal

Richmond coach Damien Hardwick has put the heat on his midfielders to lift and set the tone in Saturday night's 'Dreamtime' clash with Essendon at the MCG.

Hardwick believes the absence of prime movers Heath Hocking and Jobe Watson presents the Tigers with a special opportunity to hit the Bombers where it hurts.

"Our midfield, whilst it's going OK, is probably not playing to the standard we would like," Hardwick said ahead of training at Punt Road on Thursday.

"Clearance-wise, I think we've only won twice this year which is unlike us."

"We've had to change a few things round and hopefully we get the desired results on Saturday night."

Full article at:
http://www.sportal.com.au/afl-news-display/heat-on-tigers-mids-123054

[mightytiges]

Dimma would over the past couple of weeks be peeved about us being beaten at the stoppages and centre bounces. In close we have enough decent players to win that stat. It's on the outside and in transition we still get cut open which is where defensively we need to dramatically improve. Gifting too many easy goals where from a opposition kick-in or rebound or from a stoppage the opposition score without us getting near them nor the ball. Our short defence is deficient enough without the ball coming down their end under little pressure.

[Stripes]

I can't actually see where Dimma said anything along the lines of -

Hardwick believes the absence of prime movers Heath Hocking and Jobe Watson presents the Tigers with a special opportunity to hit the Bombers where it hurts.

  ???

What what I have read his focus was completely on his players not Essendon at all. Focus on what you can control and don't worry about what you can't.

[Judge Roughneck]

Unrealistic to not mention the other side in a build up to a game.

IMO essendon have a poor midfield outside Watson. With the like of lonergan and howlett as starting mids it'd you See it as a chance.

[Hellenic Tiger]

I think we can more than match them in the midfield. We have more pace poise and class.
I'm worried that blokes like Hille will feast on us like he has in previous years and the free ride they seem to get from the umps when we play them. Last year ring a bell?

[mightytiges]

I can't actually see where Dimma said anything along the lines of -

Hardwick believes the absence of prime movers Heath Hocking and Jobe Watson presents the Tigers with a special opportunity to hit the Bombers where it hurts.

  ???

What what I have read his focus was completely on his players not Essendon at all. Focus on what you can control and don't worry about what you can't.

It's probably alright for the coaches to focus on the opposition so we can find weaknesses to exploit them such as their ground level midfield. However the players need to just focus on what they are doing and winning the pill. If they are as well too focussed on the opposition then maybe that's a reason for our slow starts.