Star Richmond spearhead Jack Riewoldt’s brilliant 11-goal haul in last Saturday’s crushing win against Greater Western Sydney was the equal best return by a Tiger player for 83 years.
Doug Strang set an all-time goalkicking record in a match for the Tigers in Round 2 of the 1931 season, when he kicked 14 against North Melbourne at Punt Road.
Since then, the most goals in a game by a Richmond player has been 11, which Michael Roach scored twice – against Footscray in Round 7, 1980 at Western (now Whitten) Oval, and against Hawthorn in Round 5, 1985 at Princes Park.
Jack Baggott had kicked 12 goals for the Tigers, three years before Strang’s 14-goal blitz, in Round 9 of the 1928 season at Punt Road against South Melbourne.
Riewoldt has now cracked double-figure goals in a game on two occasions in his 143-game AFL career. The other time was in Round 12, 2010, when he booted 10 against the West Coast Eagles at the MCG.
Only three other players in Richmond’s history have managed to achieve this goalkicking feat more than once – Roach, Strang and Jack Titus. Roach did it five times, Strang twice and Titus on three occasions.
The other Tiger players to kick 10 goals or more in a match have been Baggott, Dick Harris, Sel Murray, Brian Taylor, Jeff Hogg and Matthew Richardson.
Riewoldt also joined a unique Richmond club with his goal blitz against GWS on Saturday, becoming the first Tiger player in 18 years to outscore the entire opposition in a game. His 11.2 (68) was 27 points ahead of the Giants’ combined 5.11 (41).
The previous time this happened was in Round 21, 1996 at the MCG when both Matthew Richardson and Brendon Gale outscored the entire Fitzroy side.
Richardson finished with 7.5 (47) and Gale 6.3 (39), out of a team total of 28.19 (187), while the Lions could muster only 5.6 (36) for the game.
And, Riewoldt’s 11-goal performance at the weekend has catapulted him into ninth place on Richmond’s all-time goalkicking list.
He’s moved past Dale Weightman and now has a total of 348 goals, which is just three behind eighth-placed Ray Poulter.
