TIGERS coach Terry Wallace is not ruling out having to combat Fraser Gehrig in this week’s clash against St Kilda.
Gehrig was dropped by the Saints two weeks ago, but has a good recent record against Richmond and could be considered for selection despite only kicking 0.1 for the Saints’ VFL affiliate Casey Scorpions last week.
“That’s up to their selection policy. He has kicked goals against us. We’ll factor in for him to be there and we will factor in for him not to be there. It’s up to what they do with their forward structure I suppose,” Wallace said.
Wallace also said there was a chance Saints captain Nick Riewoldt could play up the ground, similarly to how he has used Matthew Richardson in recent weeks.
“It depends what they are doing with their structure. Depends what is happening with Fraser and also the ruck situation – whether Michael Gardiner comes back into the side. We can only concentrate and worry about us,” he said.
Wallace is yet to coach Richmond to a win over St Kilda, with the team losing its last nine encounters to the Saints. He said the Saints had the ability to play tough defensive football but also be free-flowing and attacking.
“They’ve been a side that in the last six years has been one of the top-four sides in the competition and over that time we’ve been in the bottom four,” he said.
“We ran them pretty close in the last game of last year. It will be another interesting challenge.”
We had them in the NAB Cup and they played an attacking game on that occasion ...there’s been other days when they’ve played a more defensive style. I think they’ve got the ability to adapt both ways.”
The Tigers have more momentum going into the match, which Wallace says comes from a belief among the players.
“The biggest change is that the playing group has more trust and faith in each other to do the right things at the right time, which includes the hard work defensively, tackling and those things,” he said.
“Having blokes sacrifice a bit of their own game for the sake of the team, whether that be coming off the interchange at times when it might not be his turn to rotate. Whether that is through personnel changes or positional changes or a little bit of both. We’ve noticed the difference internally.”
