2013 Richmond Tigers Round Review
Rounds 1-5
Round 6: Richmond 13.9.87 - Geelong 20.11.131
Oh, my goodness. This was a painful game. We gave up a 19 point lead in the 2nd quarter to a 44 point loss at the siren, perhaps because we came up with some significant injuries.
Maric was limping for more than half the game, and Vickery went out with a lot of blood on his face and a concussion. Riewold had a corked thigh, King broke a bone in his thumb, and now we know that Cotchin won't start next week due to a knee injury. For a while there I thought they might be asking for volunteers from the crowd!
Aside from the injuries, we had butter fingers and a lot of kicking errors. Balls seemed to bounce unfavorably, but I don't know if that's the luck of the day or if we're not in the right position to recover errant balls. So many times we had turnovers when we had an open field ahead of us. And we had so much trouble holding onto the ball.
In our defense, we played a very good Geelong side that hadn't lost a game all season and we were very competitive until injuries started piling up. No excuses, but I'm still optimistic about this year's team.
GO TIGERS!
Round 7: Richmond 18.6.114 - Port Adelaide 10.13.73
This was a game we should have put away long before we actually did, but no complaints because we won by a decent margin even with Cotchin out with an injury. Riewoldt kicked 5 goals to help us to that victory, but the heartbreaker was the goal that Knights kicked - an amazing goal - which resulted in a significant injury as he tore his patella.
Foley was back in the game after coming back from injury, so it was good to see him on the field.
Round 8: Richmond 15.16.106 - Melbourne 11.6.72
Again, we should have had this game put away early if not for our disastrous kicking for goal! We missed so many shots early in the game that could have come back to bite us. Luckily they didn't!
I had to laugh when I read the newspaper articles about this game and saw that Coach Hardwick gave credit to Melbourne, saying, "Their niggle was outstanding."
Their what??? Their "niggle"? Oh, I love you Aussies!
It was great to see Nahas back in the game again. A goal last week and another goal this week set up by Jake King. Good team work.
No injuries that I'm aware of this week, and that's a very good thing.
Round 9: Richmond 9.8.62 - Essendon 13.13.91
Oh dear. The less said the better. We simply did not play well in this game. It was a painful one to watch.
Best to learn from our mistakes and move forward. We're better than we played today, and we'll have better games ahead.
Round 10: West Coast Eagles 8.14.62 - Richmond 16.7.103
Now this is what I'm talking about! Good on the boys for winning this one decisively! The first quarter was a very close game and I had a lot of concerns, but something happened in the second quarter and we broke it wide open. Although I remained nervous (as I always do until the final siren!) we had this game wrapped up from half time on. Well done, Tigers!
Who is this young man who has only played 6 AFL games and goes by the name of Nick Vlastuin? He made a fan out of me for sure in this game, kicking 3 goals and looking like he's got confidence!
The media write-up was incredible, stating that the Tiges had a "scintillating second quarter" against "hostile fans". We don't get to hear stuff like that very often! This is a confidence builder as we head into the bye week.
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