Wallace planning a Tiger shuffle
richmondfc.com.au
By Chris Pike
Mon 16 February, 2009
RICHMOND coach Terry Wallace was pleased with the NAB Cup win over Fremantle in a game nearing home and away intensity and he'll now shuffle his team around to face Collingwood.
Richmond came back from a 28-point first half deficit, and then trailed again by nine points in the dying minutes, but fought back to record an exciting three-point win at Subiaco Oval. Matthew Richardson starred all night on the wing and up forward, with Nathan Brown and Troy Simmonds having a big influence despite a limited preparation.
The likes of Ben Cousins, Kane Johnson, Trent Cotchin, Jordan McMahon and Adam Thomson didn’t play and Wallace will swap around quite a chunk of his team to face Collingwood in a fortnight.
"We went into the game with Troy Simmonds, Nathan Brown and Matthew Richardson only playing a quarter of a practice game and Richo and Nathan, in particular, played 80-odd per cent. We wanted to win the game so were comfortable to do that, but it might be a balancing act on what they do the next couple of weeks," Wallace said.
"We'll probably make seven or eight changes. We had a few boys that were either just a week away or unlucky to miss out. We want to give all those guys an opportunity to either get ready and having a fortnight is a bit of an advantage, but we won't play all our players over the four weeks."
The intensity of the game certainly went up after half time and was at a high level with the game on the line late. Wallace was happy to get that type of game into his side, and to overcome Fremantle's new-look tactics from defence.
"It was a good hit out for both sides. Going into the season proper, you don’t usually get that type of game at that capacity over the four quarters. Early on the home side wanted the ball more, were more ferocious and beating us in the clearances. Their new structure worked well for them while restricting our inside-50 ball use," he said.
"After half time, we realigned a couple of things in accordance to what they did and that worked. Bottom line is that you have to go and get the ball first and our boys in the middle did that in the third quarter to get us going. The last bit was the most pleasing when they had the momentum, the crowd and a breeze in their favour. To be able to pinch a goal back to get in front again was a good effort."
While Richardson was the standout player on the ground, Richmond does need key forwards to stand up and Wallace was especially happy with Jack Riewoldt's 21-possession, 10-mark and two-goal game.
"It's important for our key position forwards to stand up," he said.
"Our ability to have mobile forwards and swing things around to have Mitch Morton or Browny one out is good, but we still need some strong bodied key forwards to stand up. Jack Riewoldt was terrific playing as a key forward and that's a really pleasing step in his progress."
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