STAR Richmond forward Jack Riewoldt sought a third opinion on his injured right eye in an unsuccessful bid to be declared fit for Sunday afternoon's clash with Hawthorn at the MCG.
Riewoldt, 28, missed last week's win against Gold Coast after he suffered a knock to the eye and needed stitches to the white part and top of an eyeball at training.
He didn't have vision in that eye for six hours because of blood in the socket, and Tigers coach Damien Hardwick said at Punt Road on Friday morning that Riewoldt should be available for Saturday week's game against Geelong.
"He was pretty close. A couple more days and some training and he might have been available to play," Hardwick said.
"It's a pretty delicate area of the body that we're really wanting to make sure we look after.
"Not only went to one doctor, he went to two, then he was looking for a third to try and get the response he was after.
"That's how desperate he was to play. He's an important player for us, so we didn't want to risk any further damage. Should be available to play next week."
The risk of Riewoldt being injured again was too great for him to play, despite his desperation to face the Hawks.
"It's more to do with the amount of pressure that goes through the eye that would increase the bleeding. It's a pretty easy decision really from the medico's point of view," Hardwick said.
Hawthorn will pose a tough test for the fourth-placed Tigers. Alastair Clarkson's men started the season 0-4, but despite a heavy injury toll, with defenders James Frawley, Grant Birchall and Josh Gibson among those having spent significant time on the sidelines, they are back in the finals race.
Last Friday's six-point victory against Sydney left them one-and-a-half games behind West Coast, which is eighth.
"They're back to their best," Hardwick said.
"Offensively they're controlling the ball really well. I think the area that's probably escaping a lot of people is defensively they're doing some stuff that is elite. We showed our boys some vision this morning of how well they're doing that and controlling the ball as well."
Clarkson has revamped his backline, with regular forwards Jack Gunston and James Sicily among those having switched ends of the ground. Their intercepting prowess will be a key area for the Tigers to stop.
Richmond will keep working on hitting its forwards to help nullify that threat.
"The one thing we've done really well this year, I think we're AFL (ranked) four with inside-50 entries, which gives us enough supply," Hardwick said.
"We've just got to make sure we've got our connection inside 50 a lot better. That's probably the area that we are still working on. We have got a relatively young and inexperienced forward six, so they're still taking some time to become accustomed to how we move and how we play the game."
