Richmond coach Damien Hardwick has defended the Tigers’ recruiting philosophy, which has netted them a large group of mature-age players from rival league clubs over the past few years.
While the likes of Bachar Houli (Essendon), Shaun Grigg (Carlton), Troy Chaplin (Port Adelaide) and Ivan Maric (Adelaide) have all figured prominently in Richmond’s Best and Fairest count during this time, the team’s slow start to the 2014 season has triggered a critical assessment of the Tigers’ talent-acquisition approach from sections of the football media.
Tiger members can upgrade their seat for exclusive access to level two seats in Round 6
Hardwick, however, explained why the Club took this recruiting path, during an interview on Channel Seven’s ‘Talking Footy’ last Monday night.
“Probably the hard thing that people don’t realise, is we started rebuilding at a stage where all the (draft) picks went north. GWS and Gold Coast came in, so we, in effect, didn’t get the talent that a lot of other teams were going to get,” Hardwick said.
“Our first picks were always at the back end. They got 10 priority selections and all these type of things.
“So, we had to find another way to help get our list through to the stage where we could build.
“Thus far, I think you’d say, with six wins (2010), eight wins (2011), 10 (2012), then 15 (2013), it’s worked well.
“What we’ve got to do now, is get those players to jump again, or we go past (them).
“We’re pretty happy with those guys. They’ve come in and filled a role . . . they just need to keep performing.
“The challenge, not only for the players, but our coaching group also, is to find out whether we can get those players to jump, because we’ve got some outstanding top-end talent and we’re just waiting for that next tier of players to come through.
“We’ve got (Brandon) Ellis, we’ve got (Reece) Conca, we’ve got Nick Vlastuin and Dustin Martin. These type of players, we think, are going to be outstanding players and we’ve just got to keep developing them and get them better to get us where we need to go.
Hardwick backs recruiting plan
Richmond coach Damien Hardwick has defended the Tigers’ recruiting philosophy, which has netted them a large group of mature-age players from rival league clubs over the past few years.
