RICHMOND coach Damien Hardwick says his team's training session at Simonds Stadium on Thursday was worth the effort in the lead-up to Sunday's game at Geelong's home ground.

"[The training session] was about ground familiarisation," Hardwick said. "With the grandstand there it can be quite tricky."

The Doug Wade Stand at the southern end of Simonds Stadium has been demolished as part of the ground's redevelopment.

Its absence has created a gap through which southerly winds can race which has helped Geelong in knowing the ground's quirks.

"There was a northerly, which was good, because there's going to be a northerly on the weekend as well," Hardwick said.

"We got some good training out of it. The surface is fantastic.

"We're very much looking forward to playing there."

Richmond's training session at Simonds Stadium on Thursday was possible because of an AFL rule that enables every team to train at opposition grounds once a season.

The Tigers sprung a surprise by holding their main session of the week at the Cattery, spending more than 90 minutes on the oval, mostly at the southern end.

"It was good just for us to train at the ground and get what we could out of it," Hardwick said.

Richmond was also keen to run around on a ground whose dimensions differ greatly from those of other grounds.

The MCG is 160m by 141m while Etihad Stadium is 160m by 129m.

Simonds Stadium is 170m by 115m.

"It's very, very different," Hardwick said. "It's longer than the MCG and skinnier.

"You've got to adjust your playing style accordingly."

The Richmond coach said he'd taken nothing from the Tigers defeating Geelong by 59 points during a NAB Cup match at Simonds Stadium last month.

"Both clubs were at different stages of their preparations. Geelong had only nine or 10 players in there who are going to play in round four," he said.

He acknowledged, however, that Geelong would be stung by criticism over its poor contested possession count. The Cats have lost in this area in their three opening games, against Fremantle (loss), Hawthorn (win) and North Melbourne (loss).

Richmond has lost the contested possession count in its losses to Carlton and Collingwood, but had more contested possessions than Melbourne in last week's victory.

"Granted Geelong's numbers haven't been great, but they've played three pretty good sides," Hardwick said.

"We'll have our work cut out in that area (contested footy). It's an area we've got to improve in, too.

"We've just got to absorb what they throw at us early and go onwards and upwards from there."blog comments powered by Disqus