Although Richmond’s comprehensive 66-point victory in the AFL’s pre-season series last Saturday came against a severely undermanned Port Adelaide side, the Tigers’ coach Damien Hardwick was largely satisfied with what he saw from his charges.
Port rested a stack of its key senior players for the clash in Albury, and was no match for Richmond, who had many of its stars back in the line-up after they’d being rested for the opening pre-season game against the Western Bulldogs a couple of weeks earlier.
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“We just worry about what we can control,” Hardwick said.
“Regardless of who shows up, we’ve just got to look at our offensive and defensive patterns and see how they work. And we were pretty happy with the majority of stuff (against the Power).
“Obviously, with our guys, it was their first real hit-out, so they were a little bit rusty.
“We wasted some ball use inside 50, but overall I thought their endeavor, work-rate and intensity was pretty good.
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“End of the day, we don’t really care what the opposition give to us and (Port Adelaide coach) Ken (Hinkley) would be saying the same thing.
“It’s all about our preparation for Round 1. So it’s just getting minutes into guys . . . that’s what we’re all about, and every AFL club is trying to do exactly the same thing at the moment.”
