RICHMOND captain Chris Newman says he is not even contemplating what could happen if the Tigers go down to Melbourne next Sunday at the MCG.

The Tigers lost their third match of the season from as many rounds on Sunday, this time to the Western Bulldogs by 47 points at Docklands on Easter Monday.

Speaking post-match, Newman said the Tigers certainly can't think about any consequences if the 15th placed Demons overcame bottom-of-the-ladder Richmond.   

"We just need to focus on Melbourne and Melbourne's strengths and focus on what we do well and go after them,” the skipper said.

“Melbourne is going to come at us with everything and we need to be ready and on our game to get the result.

"We're not shying away from that. Any team that is zip and three at the start of the year – they're going to be asking questions and internally we know that it's only round three and we've got the confidence that we can turn this around.

"All we need to focus on now is Melbourne – nothing ahead of time – just Melbourne and that's all we're going to go after."

Newman conceded his team's effort was a step back from its showing against Geelong at Skilled Stadium in round two and added that Richmond fans had every right to be disappointed with the yellow and black's performance against the Dogs.

"We know that performance wasn't good enough and we had an opportunity at three quarter-time – we were [fewer] than four goals down," he said.

"There was a bit of confidence, where we thought we could get a bit of a roll on and get the result, but things didn't go our way.

"We went back into our shells a bit and we just needed to take the game on more and more in that last quarter, but we didn't."

After his side ‘let it all hang out’ in the first term, Newman said it was frustrating not to have a four-quarter effort.

"A one-quarter effort isn't good enough and we couldn't do that for the four-quarter period, so that's the most disappointing thing we took away from the game," he said.

The Tiger defender also conceded his side's skills weren't good enough.

"We know that. As Terry [Wallace] said after the game: 'if you can't hit targets and you continue to miss targets, then you just won't play'. We've just got to keep churning the players through and see where we're at," the 26-year-old said.

"I think we've got the players there, but for some reason or another, we just don't have the confidence and at times we don't back in our skills.

"If you see our skill level at training it's spot on, but we just need to relay that to game day."