De Ja Vu poured through my veins 10.15pm last Thursday night. It was happening again…Carlton whacked us off the park. I sat next to this couple which wanted Carlton to smash us off this planet - I asked her jokingly if she could ‘let us have this one’.  Unfortunately the fairytale round one victory will have to wait until at least 2013. I saw something that made me smile however - Carlton supporters have this chest beating arrogance whilst playing Richmond. They’ve beaten us the last eight times…I guess they have every right to be confident. This lady that was sitting beside me strolled through the first half without any sense of stress or desperation, I was pulling my hair out. By that third quarter she began to get nervous, until her head rested in her hands and she was yelling at everything Carlton was doing. That Carlton confidence snapped eventually and this Richmond tsunami was closing in on the Blue baggers, they managed to ride the wave but something tells me one day very soon - every team will be hit by this Richmond tsunami. They won’t know what hit em’!

To the match now and I thought we were clearly second best throughout the night. The Tigers held up in the midfield, which was really pleasing, but our defensive rebounds left me skeptical. Once Carlton was on the defense, their players covered more ground. Their spread was so crisp that our structures rarely came to fruition simply because space was non-existent. When Richmond was on the defense, on numerous occasions Carlton cracked us open like a bottle of champagne and strolled in for some easy goals. Moments like that can be flattening, but I still think we need to put things into perspective. Carlton’s coaching overhaul begin mid 2007. Denis Pagan was sacked and Ratten undertook caretaker obligations until the end of the season. Ratten’s into his fifth season as senior coach, and although we tend to see AFL through our Richmond spec’s, its important to acknowledge Damien Hardwick has had less time to develop his list and game style against Brett Ratten, two and a half years less.

I expect us to eventually surpass Carlton, but there’s no doubt a gulf between our teams in experience and game plan development. I was taken back by the difference in kick-in strategies. Carlton had set up many different tactics for attack through their defense whilst the Tigers were very uncreative in their approach to rebound defensive 50.  From what I saw we had two tactics,

1.    Bomb long passes from the kick in, past Carlton’s zone into a contested situation.
2.    Chip the ball thirty meters towards the back pocket and launch a long kick to a contested situation on the wing.

Both tactics were good theories initially. Carlton’s tall stocks were severely hit by injury, and by kicking to these contested situations, Richmond had the advantage to take the strong contested marks with Jack Riewoldt, Tyrone Vickery & Ivan Maric all pushing to the wing. The Blues were too good however, out marking us more times than not - which savaged this strategy. 

That third quarter comeback was really pleasing, that’s what I’ll take out of the game. We refused to die, we continued to claw back and that endeavor will develop alongside our players and game structure. The last 15 minutes was disappointing, but for 3 ½ quarters we matched it with Carlton. I hope our players can develop throughout the year and I pray that we find more avenues to goal from defense.

One thing to always remember Tiger heads, we have the rest of the season ahead of us, don’t be deflated by this loss, make sure you attend Collingwood Vs. Richmond this Saturday night - we don’t want them outnumbering us! Gotiges!

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