Tigers shirked contests says skipper Trent Cotchin Jake Niall
April 12, 2014 - 1:08PM Richmond skipper Trent Cotchin has singled out instances when players shirked contests as a factor in the Tigers' disappointing loss to Collingwood, saying that some players ''weren't willing to go'' when it was their turn to put their bodies on the line.
A forthright Cotchin also saidhis successful tagger, Brent Macaffer, ''got away with a lot'' in terms of the methods used to restrict the Richmond captain. Cotchin was subjected to extremely close checking by Macaffer and had only 13 disposals on Friday night, as the Tigers fell by 38 points, plunging themselves in a mini-crisis at 1-3 after four rounds.
Cotchin spoke to Fairfax Media in the rooms just after coach Damien Hardwick had addressed the team and the coach made plain his displeasure about those occasions when players had not shown sufficient hardness in the contest, as well as skill errors.
''Yeah, we spoke about just fundamental skill errors being an issue, and then just our toughness,'' Cotchin said.
''It's times where some of our players weren't willing to go and unfortunately sometimes that can be the difference in the game.''
Cotchin said Hardwick - whose ire was audible from the Richmond rooms - had spoken to the players about that failure to attack the contest on occasion.
''Yeah, frustrated, as I mentioned just a few contests where he was disappointed with some of the players' efforts, probably across the game there was a few that killed us in the end,'' Cotchin said.
Hardwick seemed to refer to the lack of umpire protection for Cotchin, without specifically mentioning them, after the game. Cotchin said of Macaffer's tactics: ''Look, I'm not one to whinge, but I mean I think we play footy to play the ball and sometimes - credit to Macaffer, he got away with a lot, but when you try and win the footy and someone's sweating on you, it's hard to control the ball, win it and then get it out to your team mates.
''But credit to him, he won the battle. I'll just make sure I beat him next time.''
Cotchin was asked whether the absence of Brett Deledio, the club's other midfield playmaker, had placed a bullseye on the captain. ''Look, it's probably a hard one to speak about from being on the field. I mean, we just try and go about our business. I mean, most weeks you get tagged, so it's just whether or not you beat them on the day and I didn't today. So I let my team mates down.
''I think all midfielders are required to win their fair share of the ball. I see that as my role within the side and there's a number of other guys who need to do the same thing and we haven't quite got to the standard that we would have liked and that's the challenge is to pick that up as quickly as possible.''
Cotchin acknowledged the challenge of leading the team when tagged heavily.
''You can't do the easy things like win the footy as easily as it sometimes can be, but the good thing about our football club is we've got, we expect 22 leaders out there when we play, each play their role and in a way that's a form of leadership and if we're not adhering to that and structure, we're letting ourselves down.''
The Tigers' captain said they had ''fought hard to get back into the game a little bit towards the end, but it was too little too late. Unfortunately that's been the case a couple of weeks in a row now.''
The Tigers started from six goals behind the Bulldogs, recovered in the second half and took the lead but lost the match by kick.
''We probably got our hands on the footy, just turned it over, gave them (Collingwood) an opportunity to get on the burst forward and I think a fair few of their midfielders kicked goals as well, so something we'll look at in review on Monday and make sure that we don't let Brisbane do the same.
''I don't think any team wants to be 1 and 3 four rounds into the season, we're going to have to have a look at ourselves initially and then what we can do differently as a team, just to make sure that we can get the games on terms earlier on, and start playing our way.''
The Tigers have Brisbane next weekend, then the enormous challenges of Hawthorn and Geelong. Hardwick, seemingly referring to the lenient umpiring of Macaffer v Cotchin, said: "There are some people out there that do give the protection. At the end of the day, I'll be showing my players that's how you tag. [Macaffer] did an outstanding job."
http://www.theage.com.au/afl/afl-news/tigers-shirked-contests-says-skipper-trent-cotchin-20140412-zqtxq.html#ixzz2ydqtiXuw
