Collingwood spoiled Damien Hardwick’s 300th game in charge of Richmond on Friday night, but the triple premiership coach expects to regain Dustin Martin (general soreness), Jacob Hopper (knee) and Jayden Short (calf) for next Saturday’s twilight fixture against the Western Bulldogs, while Robbie Tarrant will play some minutes in the VFL on Saturday.
“I think Hopper, Dustin and Short will all play next week,” Hardwick said.
“[Tarrant] will play a half tomorrow, which will be good. He has had a bit of an indifferent pre-season, but he is an experienced campaigner.”
Richmond conceded 13 of the first 14 scores and Hardwick was left to lament the Tigers’ inadequate ball use in the first half that led to 28 turnovers in the forward half, before correcting the issue after the main break.
“Probably initially (lucky to still be in it at half-time) when you have that many entries. It was a bit like us at stages. I thought we just gave away the ball. We had 28 giveaway turnovers in the front half. That’s through nothing but skill execution errors. We had eight in the second half,” he said.
“A lot of that can be put down to Collingwood’s good play, but also our poor play. We didn’t use the ball anywhere near well enough. 28 is an incredible number, and you’re going to struggle to stay in games if you give the ball away 28 times.”
