Richmond AFL finals fixture 2017: Week off doesn’t scare TigersJON RALPH
Herald Sun
11 September 2017RICHMOND says playing just one game in 26 days holds few fears leading into a preliminary final clash certain be dominated by the Tiger Army.
Tigers football boss Neil Balme said the club would hold a captain’s run on Saturday that would include some match simulation work.
The club’s fitness staff will scrutinise the GPS data of players to ensure some will be eased through the fortnight and others pushed hard to compensate for the lack of a game.
Balme said Richmond’s frenzied tackling pressure against Geelong after the post Round 23 bye was a promising sign for that preliminary final.
The Tigers also started on fire against Sydney coming off this year’s mid-season bye before the Swans eventually overran them in the final minutes.
The Tigers will play only one game — the crushing qualifying final win against Geelong — between August 27’s Round 23 win and the September 23 preliminary final.
The AFL and MCG are yet to finalise the exact number of tickets available to supporters, but as many as 80,000 Tiger fans could attend the clash.
That game will be a twilight clash starting at between 4pm to 5.10pm to allow their opponent to fly home that night.
Richmond CEO Brendon Gale urged fans to snap up tickets as soon as possible next week to ensure another yellow and black avalanche.
The told the Herald Sun that “we want as many fans there as possible”.
Potential opponent GWS would have only a few thousand travelling fans while West Coast supporters would have already travelled twice before a preliminary final.
Tigers captain Trent Cotchin said the reaction from the stands was unprecedented before Friday’s win given it was a Geelong home game.
“It was incredible. Even from the outside we came out first with big cheers and Geelong came out and geez, the booing was loud. I couldn’t believe the amount of support we had there.”
Richmond’s VFL side will play a preliminary final next Saturday but there is a real prospect the Tigers will go into the clash unchanged.
Balme said there were no fresh injuries from the dominant win and the match committee would sit down in coming days to plan out the next fortnight.
“We will have a captain’s run on Saturday and decide what to do early in the week.
“We will have some information by then on how the players are going with their GPS numbers.
“We will have a decent session, a bit of competitive work in there.
“There is a bit of both sides in having a bye. The good is you don’t have to play and suffer the effects of a game, but the bad is you are used to playing.
“We missed last week and seemed to be pretty good.”
Gale said if Tigers supporters bought tickets in droves a larger proportion of seats would become available to them given the interstate rival.
“The atmosphere was electric and when Geelong entered the ground the booing was deafening,” he said.
“We want as many Richmond fans there as possible,
“If you look at the members pre-sale for Friday night it ended up Richmond had 70 per cent of the tickets.
“You would think against an interstate opponent it is probably going to be higher so the tickets that might have been set aside for interstate members would be put back into the system.
“There is a minimum amount for competing clubs but as to how many depends on how many are taken up early.
Balme said it was impossible to discount the impact of the Tiger Army, which was estimated to have accounted for 75,000 of the 95,000 spectators on Friday night.
“The practical side of it knows no one in the crowd gets a kick, but we would rather have them with us than against us.
“It is what our club is, it is about all of us, so it’s an important part of us.”
http://www.heraldsun.com.au/sport/afl/teams/richmond/richmonds-plan-to-counter-two-spare-weekends-in-leadup-to-preliminary-final/news-story/a92f44f066d94c86000765059d2f667a
