Tigers - your time starts nowMatthew Lloyd
The Age
July 22, 2012 THE natives at Tigerland are getting restless and so they ought to be after losing the seemingly unloseable game to the Gold Coast last weekend in Cairns.
The fans have been savage on the club for selling the game for the reported $500,000 - a benefit that will now be measured against the four points lost that could have cost the Tigers a spot in the September action. It's even more controversial when you consider the club has had just two finals series in the past 27 years.
Damien Hardwick was so distraught at his post-match press conference that he couldn't even finish his sentence. But while it was an unforgivable lapse for a team with finals aspirations, in the bigger scheme of things the future at Punt Road has never looked brighter.
The Richmond coaching position has been a poisoned chalice for almost three decades, with Hardwick the 12th senior coach in that time. Resources and stability have long been a problem. I once asked a senior official how Hardwick, my ex-premiership teammate, was travelling during his first summer at the helm of the Tigers at the start of 2010, and I was nearly floored by the response.
The official told me that Hardwick's first order of business each day was to clear the possum droppings from his desk because the football department operated out of makeshift offices and the gymnasium in the Jack Dyer Stand.
A story like that gives you a greater understanding of why Richmond and other struggling clubs have to sell home games and why it's hard for them to match the powerhouse clubs in the premiership race.
As I was watching the Richmond capitulation, I couldn't help but think of an age-old problem that had come back to bite the Tigers yet again - their depth.
The Tigers were flying in rounds nine and 10 beating Hawthorn and St Kilda and looked like a finals' side, but losing Nathan Foley, Tyrone Vickery, Dustin Martin, Ivan Maric, Dylan Grimes, Daniel Jackson and Jake King among others has shown up the bottom 10 players on the Tigers list.
Under Hardwick's leadership, that list is still evolving, but the Tigers are crying out for a key defender and another couple of midfielders to add greater depth to the starting four - who are the equal of any midfield.
Of the 45 players that were on the Tigers' list when Hardwick took over from Terry Wallace at the end of 2009, just 17 remain less than three years later.
Some may say that any team would struggle with the injuries that have hit the Tigers, but I think they are still being haunted by poor drafting from 2002-2005. No recruiter gets all selections right but too many mistakes were made and the majority of those first-round selections who are no longer at the club should have now been the core senior players in the line-up.
Gary March, Brendon Gale and Hardwick look to be making up the required ground to get the Tigers competitive again.
Recent figures have shown that you can't compete in this competition if you can't put the resources into your football department and the Tigers have been in the bottom four for spending for the past 15 years. It is for that reason why I don't begrudge them selling games, because $500,000 is the difference between having an extra two coaches or not.
The argument of losing the four points away and possibly costing a finals spot doesn't wash with me. If you can't beat a team that hasn't won for a year, you don't deserve to play finals. In saying that, the Tigers look to be in a stronger financial position moving forward and can now hopefully bring that game back to Melbourne.
Hardwick is a fighter. Kevin Sheedy almost ended his playing career before it even started because he wasn't sure if he was good enough or wanted it badly enough. From that point on, he went on to be a best and fairest winner, a duel premiership player - with flags at Essendon and Port Adelaide - and a premiership-winning assistant coach with Hawthorn in 2008.
He has surrounded himself with assistant coaches who have tasted the ultimate success - Justin Leppitsch, Brendon Lade and Ross Smith. That success among the coaches will be critical to developing the right mentality among the Richmond playing group, with just Brad Miller (four finals at Melbourne) and Shaun Grigg (one at Carlton) having tasted action in September.
Hardwick's coaching panel would be imploring their senior players to not let another year go by without making the eight - they know what the players are missing out on.
I don't think Richmond is good enough to play finals in 2012, but the remaining seven rounds are critical in laying the foundations for a serious finals assault in 2013. The Tigers won six games in 2010, eight games in 2011, and are on track for around 11 wins in 2012. The fans have to be patient as the club is coming from a long way back.
This is a club being rebuilt from the ground up - on and off the field.
Telling Tiger fans to be patient is never easy, but 2˝ years into the rebuilding, I sense that the long wait is finally going to be worth it.
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