Dependable Richmond defender Dylan Grimes believes greater versatility has been a significant factor in the success of the Tigers’ backline this season.

The Tiger backs have conceded 100 points in a match only twice this season (and one of those was a win against Collingwood) and have kept the opposition to just 23 goals in the past three games.

Their capacity to share the load and work as a team within the team is crucial, according to Grimes.

“The thing that probably matters the most I feel, is if I’m caught out, I can call someone like ‘Batch’ (Jake Batchelor) or ‘Rancey’ (Alex Rance) to a smaller player that I’ve been playing on recently, and there’s not that real stress when you change over really quickly, which can put us out of position at times,” Grimes said on ‘Talking Tigers’. 

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“So, if we’re ever done, there’s opportunity for other players just to quickly roll over. 

“It might be two minutes where they’re playing . . . Rancey might be playing on a (Hayden) Ballantyne like I was last week (against Fremantle), and I was playing on ‘Pav’ (Matthew Pavlich). 

“That doesn’t really matter anymore, whereas in the past, we needed Rancey, we needed ‘Chappy’ (Troy Chaplin) to lock down the two major key forwards. 

“But now that Batch has bulked up, and there’s a bit more reliance on me to play that third tall, it’s made it a lot more even, I think.”

Grimes also detailed how the Richmond defenders had adapted to the team’s slower, more methodical style of play in recent weeks.

“It’s something that probably didn’t come naturally to the backs as a group,” he said.

“I mean, you look at Rancey and Batch and myself, we’re pretty intense, go quick all the time sort of players.  But adding that sort of string to our bow, and being more patient and more calm with the ball, has really helped us. 

“And, I think even if we change that, and we were to go really quick, really high-paced, it’s another string to the bow that we’ve learnt over the last few weeks.”