A young Richmond side has been defeated by a more-seasoned Fremantle outfit in their opening match of the NAB Challenge.
The Dockers didn't miss a beat early as they kicked the opening seven straight goals of the game at Mandurah's Rushton Park to set up an eventual ten-goal win.
It took until the 12-minute mark of the second quarter for Kane Lambert to release Connor Menadue into space for the Tigers to get their first goal, with Menadue making no mistake on the run from distance.
That major seemed to spark the visitors into action as snapped goals from Adam Marcon and Troy Chaplin followed shortly after in a period of dominance for the young cubs.
The tall-timber of the Dockers came to the fore from that point on as Matthew Pavlich and Matt Taberner marked strongly for multiple goals, while the Tigers' forward line was missing the experience of Ty Vickery and Ben Griffiths who both left the field through injury.
Shaun Grigg and Reece Conca were the leading ball winners for the Tigers with over 20 touches each, while Marcon, Corey Ellis, Oleg Markov and Mabior Chol impressed over the four quarters, with the latter getting just reward with a goal in the fourth term.
WHAT WE LEARNED
The experiment of using Troy Chaplain up forward is worth persisting with for the Tigers. He played most of the match up forward and fought a lone hand at times after Ty Vickery and Ben Griffiths spent large chunks of time on the bench due to head knocks. He kicked a goal and worked hard. The Tigers should stick with it.
NEW FACES
Oleg Markov and Mabior Chol caught the eye. Sudanese born Chol kicked a goal in the last quarter and took three marks up forward, while Markov got plenty of the ball and used it well. Jacob Townsend was quieter than last week's intra-club with just 11 possessions.
NEXT UP
The Tigers head home to Victoria to face Hawthorn at Beaconsfield in a twilight fixture next Saturday.
Richmond 0.0.1 0.3.4 0.3.4 0.4.6. 30
Fremantle 0.4.0 0.8.1 0.11.4 0.14.6 90
Supergoals:
Richmond - Nil
Fremantle - Nil
Goals:
Richmond - Menadue, Marcon, Chaplin, Chol,
Fremantle - Pavlich 4, Griffin 2, Mzungu 2, Taberner 2, Weller, Ballantyne, Hannath, Barlow
