How would you rate the AFL's treatment of Richmond this year?

[Dubstep Dookie]

How would you rate the AFLs treatment of Richmond this year in the areas of fixturing, umpiring and the MRP decisions when compared to other teams?

Is it really that bad? If so, is there a reason why we are given such a shocking run?

Or has it been ok and we just see things with a Richmond bias?

[Hellenic Tiger]

There is only one side who under a period of success can compete in terms of membership and sponsorship with Collingwood. That is us. It's an Eddie initiative to keep us down for as long as possible. Beware the sleeping Tiger.

[Chuck17]

FFS 30 years of getting shafted by the AFL 

[georgies31]

Our draw was a shocker.How can a team that has been at bottom half for a number of years play most of the top 8 teams and top 4 teams in the first 10 rds.Compare our draw to the bombers it's a disgrace.

[Hard Roar Tiger]

I'm more concerned with the Coaches treatment of WP and his quest to throw that word into mainstream english

[Smokey]

 

[Francois Jackson]

Excuses excuses excuses
If we made the 8 this thread would be dead and buried

Get real

[RollsRoyce]

Yeah Daniel, except that it's pretty hard to make the 8 when the odds are so consistently stacked against you, and that's kind of the point.

[Francois Jackson]

I was at the game RR like I've been at every game this year and the only issue is with Jack R crying like a bitch or looking at the ump waiting for him to blow his whistle

Outside of the arsendon game unpring has had no bearing on any result this year

[Coach]

I'm more concerned with the Coaches treatment of WP and his quest to throw that word into mainstream english

What word cocko?

[RollsRoyce]

I was at the game RR like I've been at every game this year and the only issue is with Jack R crying like a bitch or looking at the ump waiting for him to blow his whistle

Outside of the behindndon game unpring has had no bearing on any result this year

Daniel, I didn't make any reference to you going to games or otherwise. The issue is whether Richmond has been harshly treated by the AFL, and I believe we have, and not JUST over umpiring. Take the fixture: While we were playing all 8 finalists in the opening 10 rounds, North were playing teams entrenched in the bottom reaches of the ladder, and have return games against both GC ans GWS.
 Then there's the MRP: There are multiple examples of cases where we have copped rough justice, but I will cite just the most recent one. Matthew White, who is deemed  to have neither a good or bad past record by the panel (whatever the hell that meant), gets 3 weeks for bumping Frawley's shoulder with his shoulder. I have watched that footage several times, and there's no contact with the head. The same penalty that Wellingham gets for breaking Simpson's jaw!!!
 As for Jack whinging: OK, maybe he shouldn't do it. But maybe like a few Tiger players, (eg. Lids on Sunday), he is getting sick of being screwed over by the whistle blowers. Umpires need to do their jobs properly and call a free as they see it. But once again Jack was mauled all day long with no free, while the second McGuane touched Petrie it was a free. And once again, I can think of multiple games this year alone where poor and biased umpiring against Richmond had a HUGE bearing on the result. I suppose we will just have to agree to disagree. 

[Tigeritis™©®]

Excuses excuses excuses
If we made the 8 this thread would be dead and buried

Get real

a ridiculous thread.

We are either good enough or not regardless of who we play, where we play or when we play.

It shouldn't matter even if we have the worst draw or the best draw. If the umpiring is stacked against us or we beat teams against the odds. If we win even when all is going against us, how sweet a victory.
Winning a premiership is what's important and the club should be doing everything in it's power to make it happen, there's no point crying about things out of our control.

When we are good enough and we finally can lift that cup up again it won't matter one iota what the stats are for the year.
 

[Coach]

'We are either good enough or not regardless of who we play, where we play or when we play.'

Quoted for the truth

[WilliamPowell]

Struth we are hard to please 

People post on here that we are one of the "big" Clubs in the comp but when we get treated like one, we are getting treated harshly or unfairly. Dont think we can have it both ways

I've said a number of times regarding the fixture we put in our wish list which includes round 1 against the Blues and an early season game against the Pies, we get them and we still complain.

Last time I checked the AFL didn't force us to sell a home game to Cairns - we did that all by ourselves so we can't sook about that bit of fixturing.

Yes we played some of the top teams in the early rounds but when we played the Eagles did we have to travel? Nope - we had them here and BTW should have won that game but for some really poor decisions and skill errors (most crucial loss of the year IMHO). Outside of the Geelong venue debacle the draw in the first 7 rounds the draw wasn't as bad as people make it out to be

The easy out is to (dare I say it) look for excuses.

But when it is all said and done IMV:

1) Good teams win games, wherever they are played against whatever the oppositions, they don't worry about fixturing

2) Good Clubs don't go looking for excuses or apportioning blame they just get on with the job of winning games



As for the MRPand umpiring: ever club has reason to be critical of the farce that is the MRP and the system we operate under and as for the umpires I don't believe in blaming umpries for losses. Yes they make some howlers (Sunday being a perfect example) but to blame them for losses is a cop out

[RollsRoyce]

WP, you may notice if you read through my post that I stopped short of actually saying the umpires cost us a victory this season. What I said was that they had a huge bearing on the result, and I stand by that. I don't think it's too much for any supporter to ask to be able to go to a match and not be wondering in the back of their mind how the officiaters are going to be impacting negatively on my team on any given week. Sadly, I reckon a lot of us are in this situation though.