Richmond great Matthew Richardson has paid tribute to his former teammate, Nathan Foley, on the eve of the veteran Tiger midfielder reaching the 150-game milestone in Friday night’s big clash with Essendon at the MCG.

“’Axel’ did it the hard way.  He had to come off the rookie list . . . wasn’t initially picked up, and went into the rookie draft,” Richardson said on this week’s edition of the Club’s official podcast ‘Talking Tigers’.

“I reckon guys that do it the hard way, like Axel did, they come to the Club with just an exceptional attitude.  And, I just remember that he came in, trained exceptionally hard, and did everything right.

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“He used to weigh his food – he probably still does now . . . he just did every possible thing that he could do, on and off the track, to make sure that he made it as an AFL footballer, and he more than did that.  He’s now played 150 games.

“What he brought to the team, when he first came in, was just his life, his run-and-carry, and his burst out of packs.

“That was almost a bit before its time, that sort of play with Axel.  Those sort of players are so important now.

“I reckon in 2008, when he played for Victoria, he got picked in the Victorian team with absolute superstars around him.

“He was one of the elite midfielders of the competition at that stage.  He’s had some injuries since, which curtailed him, but I reckon he’s starting to really get back to somewhere near his best now, Axel, and it couldn’t happen to a better ‘fella’.”