PREVIEW ROUND 5 - RICHMOND vs ST KILDA - Docklands (AWAY)
SUMMARY:
A threepeat of wins, the last a 48 point demoliltion of a totally inept Fremantle side, sees Richmond
travel across town to the Telstra Dome this Sunday for the match of the round clash against last season's preliminary finalists St Kilda. The Tigers have been steadily improving week by week albeit against lowly opposition with both young and old contributing to our wins. This week's game however will be a major challenge and step up in class for the Tiges and will provide a good guide to see not only where we are at in the early stages of the new Wallace era but also by how much we have genuienly improved. Richmond will most likely go into the match unchanged with Morrison, Meyer and Roach brought in to make up a squad of 25.
Our opponents St Kilda had a tardy start to the 2005 season before blowing away the then undefeated Demons in the second half of their clash last weekend. Ominously a number of the Saints "big guns" in particular Gehrig rediscovered their form of last year. They are strengthened this week by the return of Robert Harvey and Koschitzke. Former Magpie Mark McGough has also been added to their sqaud.
PAST ENCOUNTERS:
Overall: 102-59-2
In the 00's: 4-4
At Docklands: 3-4
Last Time:
Round 16, 17.07.04. "Home" at Docklands.
Richmond 4.1 4.3 5.5 9.7-61
St Kilda 5.3 10.5 15.8 16.9-105
Multiple Goalkickers: Richmond - Richardson 6; St Kilda - Riewoldt 5, Milne 4, Guerra 4, Hamill 2.
Attendance: 34,631
KEY STATS AND MATCH-UPS:
DEFENCE: A stronger and more disciplined defensive performance not only in our backline itself but across all lines has moved Richmond statistically from being the worst defence in the AFL to one on par with their opponent this week in terms of points conceded (average 96 per match). The task this week is to contain a Saints forward line missing star Nick Riewoldt yet still containing the likes of Gehrig, Hamill and the nippy Milne. All three were far too good for the Melbourne defence last week. The returning Koschitzke will rotate between the ruck and forward line. IMO Gas will start on Gehrig and wither Bowden or Hall on Hamill (we typically use to play ex-Tiger Zantuck on Hamill) with the other on Koschitzke. The main advantage Gehrig and Hamill have is their physical strength and being able to out-muscle opposition backmen in 1-on-1 contests. On paper we don't really have a defender capable of matching them in this department. Our backmen rely more on outjudging the flight of the ball. Thus to contain their key forwards our efforts in the midfield from the past few weeks of restricting quick direct supply and dropping back a loose man or two to block the space in front of forward need to be repeated.
At ground level Milne and Guerra (if he plays) pose the greatest threat based on past meetings between us and the Saints. The way to take Milne out of the game is to force him wide so he is jammed in against the boundary line. It is when he is allowed space "front and square" that he becomes dangerous with his quick snaps on goal. Presumably Chris Newman who has been in great form so far this year would get first crack at Milne. Newman will be able to run off Milne to make him accountable provided we don't gift possession back to St Kilda in the form of dumb turnovers. That leaves Kellaway, Graham and Tivendale off a half-back to take a Fiora or even Voss who snagged 4 goals last week surprising playing in the Saints' forward line.
MIDFIELD: Sunday's clash will be a contest between two midfields who can attribute their recent respective wins to getting their hands on the footy and clearing it effectively from stoppages. This has allowed both team's forward lines to remain for the most part uncongested. As we saw last week Richo and Gehrig each kicked 6 goals. The Saints are number one in the AFL at winning the footy both in loose and pack situations. The main contributors to their success in this area have been young stars Luke Ball and Nick Dal Santo along with their former 2004 captain Lenny Hayes. To date all three have won plenty of the footy and have been the main drivers in terms of clearances from stoppages and delivering the football accurately inside the St Kilda forward 50. Not far behind are veterans Harvey and Andrew Thomson while the younger Clarke brother Raphael has also made an impact this year. His size makes him more versatile than Xavier.
In our recent wins viewing from the other side of the fence, it appears we've done our homework well on identifying the three (3) major hard ball winners from the opposition and consequently have been able to nullify two of them while the third has little real influence of the game. In round 3, the three were West, Cooney and Hahn while last week for Freo they were Haselby, Josh Carr and Bell. Obviously this weekend Cogs, Tuck, Brown, Hyde and co need to target and attempt to match it with the above mentioned trio fo Ball, Dal Santo and Hayes with possibly Cambo "running" with Harvey when he plays in the middle. Conversely the Saints will themselves use little thugs Baker and Guerra as taggers most likely on Hyde and Browny. One deficiency the Saints have in their midfield brigade is their inability in the main to contribute to goalscoring despite getting their hands on the pill often. The only Saint to buck the trend is ex-Tiger Aaron Fiora hence the over the top jubilation from Saint supporters towards him in his short time at St Kilda. We ourselves haven't as yet reached the goalscoring power from our midfield IMO we need to aspire to. However Browny, Krakouer, Tuck and Cogs have contributed sufficiently to the scoreboard.
The one area we need to exploit to have a chance to pull off a upset is in the ruck. With full-time ruckmen in Knobel, Staff and Simmonds we have the potential to stretch most teams in ruck duels. They will contest against Cain Ackland who had the best game of his career last week and Koschitzke. Both have been underwhelming in their AFL stints so far and have been played typically as fill-ins for the ruck. Blake if he makes the 22 may also fill in for the Saints.
FORWARDS: While highly rating both St Kilda's forward line and midfield, their defence is IMHO still a significant weakness for them especially so at the moment with Penny out injured. Defenders like Hudghton, Schwarze and Maguire along with defensive taggers such as Baker have disposal that is no better than many of the our own senior backmen that we are critical off. Their skillful midfield through winning the footy more often than not covers for any skill deficiencies down back becoming an issue along with the springboard attacks from Aussie Jones who we can't allow to get cheap loose footy. We have the forward structure to cause them problems on Sunday as they will struggle to find someone capable 1-on-1 to match Richo for height, strength and running power nor cover all of Simmonds (or Staff), Browny, etc. However if we get smashed in the midfield and can't get our hands on the footy and get it inside 50 quickly as we have recently against them in past meetings then that advantage will be non-existent. I would expect Hudghton to play on Richo, Maguire on Simmonds and it looks like Browny will have to put up with the dirty Baker. Pettifer possibly given the job of battling with Aussie Jones.
Overall: The step up in class makes this a huge challenge for the Tiges especially after our first round disaster against another preliminary finalist in Geelong. As TS said on the forum this match will be a test on how we perform under the pressure of a big game against a high quality opponent in front of a big crowd. Last time just as we have as a Club for the past decade we failed dismally in this atmosphere. Hopefully the boys this time haved learned from round 1 and will be competitive for the majority of the game, make the most of their chances and keep fighting on. The winner like most games of footy will be determined by who ends up controlling the midfield and central corridor.
THIS WEEK'S TEAMS:
RICHMOND
B: Jackson, Gaspar, Chaffey
HB: Kellaway, Bowden, Newman
C: Tivendale, Coughlan, Hyde
HF: Brown, Simmonds, Krakouer
F: Deledio, Richardson, Stafford
R: Knobel, Tuck, Campbell
Int (from): Graham, Pettifer, Hall, Raines, Morrison, Meyer, Roach
IN: Morrison, Meyer, Roach
ST KILDA
B: Baker, Maguire, Voss
HB: Schwarze, Hudghton, Jones
C: Peckett, Hayes, Harvey
HF: Fiora, Koschitzke, Dal Santo
F: Milne, Gehrig, Hamill
R: Ackland, X.Clarke, Ball
Int (from): Goddard, Thompson, R.Clarke, McGough, Guerra, Blake, Fisher
