Wakelin, who played a combined total of 252 AFL games for St Kilda and then Collingwood, in a career spanning 15 seasons, believes the Tigers’ performance is symptomatic of the competition’s developing young teams.
“I look through some of the quality characters (Damien) Hardwick has developed under his tutelage, who consistently put in a lot of effort. And, I’m talking about guys like Foley, Jackson, young Martin, Deledio, Cotchin, and young Grigg, who’s come across from Carlton . . . very, very good, quality individuals, who consistently put their head over the footy. I think that was the most disappointing thing for Damien Hardwick (last Saturday),” said the dual Collingwood Grand Final defender.
“He knows the character of these young kids, they’ve given him the effort consistently over arguably the last 18 months, and this is just a short-term blemish. They’ll get on with it this week . . .
“A lot of the time we expect this smooth improvement from a lot of sides. But we’ve seen Melbourne get into a little bit of a rut, we’ve seen Essendon over the past five weeks really struggle, and now we’ve seen Richmond get blown away.
“I think within the evolution, or the development of any potential top-four side - look at Geelong back in 2006 - they always have that season, or a period of time, where they’ll totally reverse their form and intensity and we think, gee, they’ve gone backwards. But then, over the course of the next six to eight weeks, they really find that consistency and level of intensity.”
