Finals may now be off the agenda for Richmond this year, following last Friday night’s disappointing 38-point loss to Port Adelaide at Adelaide Oval, but the Tigers still have plenty to play for in the remaining eight home-and-away rounds of the season, according to two key members of their playing leadership group.

“We’re a proud football club . . . and the reality is you don’t walk out on the weekend to lose games of footy,” Richmond captain Trent Cotchin told the ABC’s ‘AFL Grandstand’.  

“The challenge for us is to make sure that we go out there with an attitude that we want to win. 

“That’s why we play the game, that’s why we play the game from a young age. 

“It’s enjoyable when you’re winning with your mates, whether that be at AFL (level) or under-12s.”

Star key defender Alex Rance was adamant there would be no intensity drop-off within the playing group despite a finals berth in 2016 now being out of reach for the Tigers.

“As a leadership group we’ll be very strong on the fact that, regardless of whether we play finals or whether we’re in last place, it shouldn’t matter.  The process should stay the same,” Rance said on SEN. 

“We apply the same work ethic to getting better every training session because, if you’re measuring success on wins and losses, rather than a process and execution of a game plan, then that’s when you can sometimes reward bad behaviours. 

“So we need to keep driving good positive standards and development.  And, if blokes are going to pack up shop and start to play for themselves, then I guess that’ll be a real litmus test of whether they want to be here or not. 

“We’ve got to keep driving that as leaders to make sure that the standards stay high.  And, whether we’re in contention or not, it shouldn’t matter.”