Can we win the flag without Rance?

[one-eyed]

As per thread title:

Can we still win the flag without Rance?

[one-eyed]

Jon Ralph's take ...

Can Tigers win flag without Rance?

Jon Ralph,
Herald Sun
23 March 2019

Richmond might still be able to defy the hammer blow of Alex Rance’s injury to win the 2019 premiership.

But if the Tigers hold up the cup this season they will do it in a manner unrecognisable to their extraordinary 2017 campaign.

For all their offensive weapons, the Tigers won that flag on a bedrock of defence — team defence, brilliant one-on-one defence, and a feverish tackling style that sucked the life out of opponents.

In three straight finals they kept Geelong, GWS and Adelaide to 40, 67 and 60 points — a phenomenal feat.

And Rance was at the heart of it, denied the 2017 Norm Smith Medal only because the ball stopped getting down to him aftera sublime first half.

His probable replacements are relative unknowns — a 19-year-old Rance clone and a defender “you’d want your daughter to marry”.

Noah Balta made his debut on Thursday night as a back-up ruckman and versatile key-position player after Hardwick told Fox Footy in the pre-match that Balta reminded him of 200-gamer Rance.

He spent time in the VFL last year as a key defender, giving the Tigers the option of playing him back and bringing Ivan Soldo in for more ruck depth.

Balta has excellent junior pedigree as the No.25 draftee in the 2017 national draft, and in December Richmond forwards coach Justin Leppitsch labelled him the most impressive athlete he had seen.

However, the more likely change is third-year defender Ryan Garthwaite, who returned in the VFL on Thursday.

Drafted as the No.72 selection in 2016, he impressed as a late inclusion for David Astbury in Round 13 last year.

Captain Trent Cotchin said last year Garthwaite was the kind of person “you’d want to marry your daughter”, while Jack Riewoldt has described the blond full-back as the “nicest bloke you’ll ever meet”.

More importantly, he can play as a stopper who also flies for his intercept marks.

Richmond’s challenge of covering a champion’s injury isn’t unique, it’s just unique to the current-day Tigers.

Their big four — Rance, Jack Riewoldt, Dustin Martin and Trent Cotchin — have missed just 14 games since the start of the 2014 season.

So if the Tigers are to win the premiership this year without Rance, they might need to blow rivals off the park with high-octane offence.

They will need to score more heavily to win because they can no longer play eight defenders, and they can no longer rely on Rance repelling opposition advances like a human Pong computer game.

The club had already identified the need to tinker with their surge-based method this year under the new 6-6-6 rules.

It chased big forward Tom Lynch hard not only because he was a darn good player but also because he fitted where the game was going.

So Lynch at least gives them the chance to turbo-charge an offence that already scored heavily with less conventional methods. His three-goal first-up performance was remarkable.

There’s little doubt Richmond will win enough home-and-away games to qualify for September.

But can they beat three finals rivals in match-ups that will require their defenders to stand Josh Kennedy and Jack Darling, Jack Gunston and James Sicily, and Josh Jenkins, Taylor Walker and Tom Lynch?

Hardwick will slot Garthwaite or Balta into that massive back six vacancy.

But he’ll know he won’t be able to judge just how much the team misses Rance until the final weeks of the premiership season.

MATCHES MISSED SINCE ROUND 1, 2014 (118 GAMES)

Dustin Martin 2 (soft-tissue injuries in 2014, 18)

Jack Riewoldt 2 (scratch to eyeball 2017)

Alex Rance 7 (two-week suspension 2016, five weeks after a bike accident 2014)

Trent Cotchin 4 (one week with a knee injury in 2018, two weeks with fractured cheekbone 2016, one with a back injury 2015)

Total: 15

Of those 118 games there has been only one match when two of those players have been missing — Cotchin and Rance missed Round 7, 2016. Richmond lost to Hawthorn by 46 points.

ALEX RANCE IN 2018

Third-best key defender based on AFL Player Rankings

Best intercept marking key defender

Fifth-best spoiler of key defenders

Fifth-best intercept marker of key defenders

https://www.heraldsun.com.au/sport/afl/expert-opinion/jon-ralph/exciting-youngsters-get-their-chance-to-step-up-in-alex-rances-absence/news-story/6918764ea803bd660f57a68ee91bf9bc

[wayne]

Of course, but it's not about the guy who replaces him so much, there needs to be more pressure up field to stop easy entries.

[georgies31]

No doubt we can and it's been proven.Cat's won the flag the year the best player left them and eagles did it without there best midfielder and premier ruck.I hope this galvanise the group and makes us stronger.No dout loosing your best player is hard,but I see it us a opportunity for our kids to ,Garth,Balta and Moore.

[one-eyed]

Chris McDermott in the Adelaide Advertiser reckons "our premiership hopes are in tatters" and we "are battling for a place in the top-eight, and scrambling for a way to fill an unfillable void".

---------------------------------

Tigers’ Rance loss gives all clubs pause for thought

Chris McDermott,
The Advertiser
24 March 2019

In the blink of an eye — or is that the snap of a knee — Richmond’s 2019 premiership hopes are in tatters.

One man doesn’t make a team but when it’s a player of the uniqueness of key defender Alex Rance, it changes a team’s dynamic so much there is simply not enough time in modern football to make the adjustments to cover his absence.

Rance can play as a shutdown defender or a loose man. He can play big or small, and while he has his critics, he has far more admirers and only those at Tigerland will know the true meaning of his loss for the rest of 2019.

Forwards might win minor-round matches but defenders win you premierships, and with confirmation Rance will miss the rest of the season, the Tigers’ defence is broken.

Coach Damian Hardwick will be hard at work, looking for a solution. He will have already run all the simulations to cover such a central figure.

“What if we lose Alex Rance?” — but he surely would not have thought he would be putting those plans into action so early.

Suddenly, a genuine contender for the flag has come back to the pack.

Reality now is the Tigers are battling for a place in the top-eight, and scrambling for a way to fill an unfillable void.

Such is life in the AFL. Yet, as big a blow as Rance’s injury is, it could have been worse.

The sight of Jack Riewoldt laying on the ground in the middle of the MCG, following an off-the-ball hit from Liam Jones, would have had every Richmond fan watching on in horror. Fortunately, he got to his feet and soldiered on.

https://www.adelaidenow.com.au/sport/afl/expert-opinion/chris-mcdermott/ramifications-of-the-rance-injury-will-not-only-be-felt-at-richmond/news-story/1dba3423e0dd63b84b3046aed661cdf4

[Lozza]

Couple of other teams without so called pivotal players have appeareared to have covered their loss with little or no effect to team performance.

If trying to find a positive from Rance going down is that it has occurred so early in the season and allows the coaches to adjust team structures and experiment a little as we go. A late season injury prior to finals for example would be much harder to cope with.

[georgies31]

Headline should read crows in tatters in rd 1 since being choked by tigers 2 seasons ago.

[WilliamPowell]

Yes we can!

We keep getting told how good our depth is

Well we are about to find out just how good

Not disputing it is a massive loss but it is also a massive opportunity to for blokes to go to new levels that they themselves don't realise they are capable of.

Bring it on I say.

[cub]

Yes we can!

We keep getting told how good our depth is

Well we are about to find out just how good

Not diuting it is a massive loss but it is also a massive opportunity to for blokes to go to new levels that they themselves don't realise they are capable of.

Bring it on I say.

yep this

[Rampsation]

I hope Im wrong but I dont think we can. Rance isnt just one playet he is 3 players rolled into 1. People need to remember how many times over the years he has come off his man to spoil someone else or just saved the day in defence with a heroic gutsy act. We dont have another one like him and we will leak the goals that Rance always seemed to save. Hardwick needs to change the ststem in defence. Maybe go smaller and quicker and have more run now. Stack maybe the option.

[TFL]

I think Garth’s will surprise many, he is an old fashioned back man and hates conceding. Bit of a mixture of grimes Rance and Astbury.

Balta will add another cog to the mix too, I’d like to see him have a crack at Cox this week.

He has height, speed and the leap to be able to get in front and spoil his marking attempts.

Our backline will change week to week now I think depending on match ups

But no reason why we can’t win the flag, personally I think our contested ball and clearances is a bigger issue rather than losing Rance that will stop us winning the flag.

[mightytiges]

Rance is a massive loss and his absence may prove to be a bridge too far to cover. There's no getting away from that.

However, one thing it will do is free us up. Most commentators will now write us off so there will be no pressure nor expectation on us to go all the way unlike last year. We can now play with the freedom of the underdog and as the hunter again like we did in 2017.

[Willy]

I understand your point but I don’t think many commentators are writing us off.

[YellowandBlackBlood]

Of course we can although it will be a lot more difficult.

Guys like Garthwaite (when fit), Balta, Stack, Markov, Menadue and even Bellis may have to raise their game to help out in defence. We should pick sides that reflect the opposition attack (talls and shorts) to help them out.

[mat073]

All teams lose good players to injury.

We are a well coached system based team. I expect we will keep on destroying the opposition.  . It's an amazing opportunity for someone else to step up.