Hardwick: no more charity / Dimma's press conference Nov 11 (audio and summary)

[one-eyed]

Audio of Hardwick's media conference today:

http://www.sportal.com.au/mediaplayer/audio/AFL/damien-hardwick-tigers-are-up-and-about-11647


Edit: Some video of Dimma as well:
http://www.foxsports.com.au/AFL/richmond-coach-sends-warning/video-e6frf33l-1226192637236?subcat=1225916318050&site=FoxSports

[one-eyed]

Summary

* Yeah really good, we were very impressed with the times they ran. They've been really diligent even coming in through the club over summer which is what we expected and we're hoping to see the dividends over the course of the pre-season. We've set some pretty lofty ambitions for a lot of our guys and they've come back in reasonably good shape which is great.

* We've got 10-12 guys missing. We had a large surgery list at the end of last season (2011). The positive is most of those guys are up and running but back on the soft surfaces at Punt Rd. They'll join in with the full group in the next 2-3 weeks. Confident by Christmas we'll have a full list on deck.

* King - during the year it'd be a 3-4 week injury so he's fine. He's have a run next week. So we're confident he'll be back into training as he's a pretty fit guy as you know. So he'll be back annoying the hell out of us in a couple of weeks.

* One of our big aims was to get 500 games into our players 22 and under and we've done that so now it's no-holds-barred, we'll be looking to play the best players possible and get our team up and going. We're looking to upward trend again. Last year we improved from the previous year and we'll be looking for that sort of situation again. Every player that plays will earn their jumper this year (means 2012) more so than us looking to develop certain players. We'll expect an experienced team coming forward.

* Preseason we'll be pretty much the same. It's a young squad and our training is improving. We've just to got to maintain and up the ante. This year like last year we've just got to be careful. It's a six month preseason which is long time. One of the longest in world sport. We've just got to make sure when we train we train with the passion and intensity required but not overtrain them at the same time.

* Morris - look he's a competitive beast. We've seen that already in a couple of sessions. His competitive nature is what is going to get him to where he needs to go. We'd be disappointing if he didn't play some form of senior footy next year.

* Maric - Ivan is a competitive individual and that's what we are after. We've got to improve in a number of areas and the ruck is one of them and that's why we got him across to the footy club.

* No interest in Zac Dawson at this stage. You've got to remember this year we got a few injuries to our back six. Kel Moore didn't play a game; Astbury went down after 5-6 weeks; Grimes went down also at about the same time. So we think we are relatively okay in that area. We're just inexperienced. We just got to keep developing those. Justin Leppitsch will work with them as will Ross Smith who we got across from Hawthorn. So we are relatively confident we are well stocked in that area.

* Moore - he's in rehab. He had a pretty significant injury obviously and had some pretty serious surgery. He's progressing well and is on an upward trend. We're hoping he can get back to something like full fitness and full training after Christmas which would be a reasonable result for us.

* We're not going to make any bold predictions thus far but once again we'd be disappointed if we didn't win more games than last year like every team will be. We're looking to win more games in essence. We've put in two years of hard work to try and get our squad to the desirable result we're after and we'd be disappointed if we didn't go above and beyond last year.

* Tuck - We've got a relatively young squad as you know so it's good to have a hard body around our squad also. We were very lucky this year with injuries - Cotchin didn't miss; Martin didn't miss and also played 22 games. Shane's one of those guys that provides midfield depth for us. He's a quality player when he's in there. When he came back into the side he contributed very well. He deserved his year and what happens from here we're not sure.

* Interest in Travis Tuck? Not at all.

[tigtuff12]

liked that he said players would have to "earn the jumper & not be gifted games" now that he's got some game time into younger blokes - proof will be in the pudding if it's true/realistic or not

fairly measure interview but on the plus side - good to hear Kel Moor is progressing ok, glad they haven't totally ruled a line through Tucky (of the shane variety), glad there was no interest in Zac, sounds like the boys came back in good nick (judging by results) - all augers well for what I hope is a solid/fierce preseason & stepping stone/building bloke for 2012 & beyond