Richmond coach Damien Hardwick has the utmost confidence his Tiger charges are set to take the next step in season 2016, which kicks off this Thursday night, but he’s fully aware it’s now time for action rather than words.

“This is a very driven group.  They’re ready to succeed.  That’s the easy part, though . . . it’s all talk,” Hardwick told ‘Fox Footy’.

“What we’ve got to do is start to prove our credentials on the field. 

“It starts from week one, all the way through to week 23, and then finals beyond that. 

“But we’ve got to give ourselves a chance to get there first, and the competition’s going to be incredibly stiff . . .

“We’ve worked incredibly hard on a number of areas in our game, that we felt we could improve from last year, and the proof will be in the pudding in the early rounds how we go with that.”

Greater scoring power shapes as a key part of Richmond’s plans to go to a higher level in 2016.

“We’re probably looking for two more goals a game,” Hardwick said.

“Defensively, we’re very solid as a side . . . team defence is something we do very well.  Offensively, we’re probably lacking those two goals. 

“How you get those two goals is a hard thing. 

“People will say just get a player in to generate those.  But it’s generally through clearance and through turnover. 

“So we’ve been working on a number of areas of our game where we can get better in those. 

“From a clearance point of view, we’ve got to score a little bit better from those, and also the ability to score more from our centre-forward turnover opportunities.”