AFL Coach’s Clipboard: Richmond mentor Damien Hardwick reveals how the Tigers plan to rediscover premiership form

With Trent Cotchin in the twilight of his career, Richmond needs its next generation to fill the midfield void. And Damien Hardwick has earmarked two players who can step up in 2022.

Last season became a write off at Punt Rd — for myriad reasons.

But coach Damien Hardwick says Richmond has put the perils of 2021 behind it and is ready to show the footy that delivered three premierships in four years.

How will he do it?

He tells Scott Gullan exclusively in the latest edition of our Coach’s Clipboard series.

Stream every match of every round of the 2022 Toyota AFL Premiership Season Live & Ad-Break Free During Play on Kayo. New to Kayo? Try 14-days free now.

Noah Balta, Josh Gibcus and the boy called Samson up forward? Damien Hardwick says the Tigers have plenty of options in attack.

SCOTT GULLAN:As usual a lot of the focus over the off-season has been on Dustin Martin, sadly not all for the right reasons. How is he shaping up for 2022?

DAMIEN HARDWICK: It was a massive injury and Dustin is back training but obviously he had a difficult off-season with his father Shane passing. Around the club he is quite open, he is very loyal, requires trust but is just such a wonderful young man. To see the struggles he went through with the injury first and foremost and then the loss of his greatest influence of his life, Shane, was hugely challenging for him. He will battle on, he will get stronger again. He is in a good place at the moment and back training and we expect him to have a good season again. He‘ll probably play similar positions, the percentage of where he plays might be a little bit different. I would like to say I have a great bearing over that but Dustin puts himself where he knows he needs to be, to be honest.

Dusty’s back – and the coach says he’s fit as hell. Picture: Getty Images

How disappointing was it to lose two promising talls, Callum Coleman-Jones and Mabior Chol, after investing a lot into them?

I love both of those boys, to be honest, but we will never stand in the way of opportunity for a player, if they are going to get a better opportunity. CJ we invested a lot of time in but he thought he was going to be a better opportunity to get a consistent game at North and we could understand his thinking. Marbs was the same, he has been in our system seven years and lived the whole time with friends of mine but he got a four-year deal to play consistent footy at the Gold Coast Suns and we couldn’t stand in his way. It was a great offer, life-changing and we never stand in way of opportunity but what it does promote is opportunity from within. There is a young guy by the name of Samson Ryan who we are very bullish on, he’s young and undeveloped, he’s 207cm forward type and he’s really promising.

Noah Balta is another young guy we have got big plans for as well and our first draft pick Josh Gibcus is going very, very well, he’s 196cm very athletic, incredible competitor and he is going to be a very good player for us long term. That allows us flexibility so with Noah, do we play him up forward? He has been training with the forwards he has been going very, very well. It’s exciting, he is a difference maker, he’s got X-factor, he’s incredibly athletic, can take a good mark and is a thumping kick as well. We’re trying to figure out how it all works, we’re not sure yet but we are working our way through it.

Balta forward is going to get Tigers fans up and about. You threw the magnets around a bit late in the season, what else did you learn?

That was the one thing about when the season was lost to a degree you do get to look at some things, to regenerate in a way internally and then you can add through the draft. We found Daniel Rioli at half-back as we had a fair understanding that it was going to be Bachar’s (Houli) last year so we needed another running dashing half-back and Daniel it was a good move, and he will only get better for the training over the off-season.

Sydney Stack is an interesting one, we like him down back but also really like what he can do up forward, he went forward late in the Hawthorn game and kicked a couple of crucial goals and set up another. He’s got incredible ability, we are just hoping to get the best out of his ability. It is challenging, I mean this time last year he was just out of jail. We say it all the time, Sydney has got more ability than 90 per cent of players in the AFL, he’s just got to understand how to use it and there is only one person that’s going to do that, we are there to guide him but Sydney is going to decide how far he goes.

The Tigers plan to use Noah Balta up forward in 2022. Picture: Getty Images

What has Robbie Tarrant brought to the table so far?

That was a really good get. Robbie been a fantastic servant at North and been a one-club player, he is a really loyal guy so for him to commit to the Tigers was a really, really tough challenge for him because he loves that footy club that he has been with for 13 or 14 years. We are really excited to have him, he is a big boy, I didn’t realise the size of him. We lost Dave Astbury, who was a wonderful leader of our football club, and Robbie is just going to come in and make a seamless transition and be really good for Josh Gibcus down there and Tom Brown, who is another kid we are really excited about.

We know every club talks about how great their pre-season is at this time of the year but I‘m hearing you’ve had some of your senior players have been doing a lot more than previously, led by Dion Prestia?

Dion has had a great pre-season. He has barely played footy over the last two years, he missed large chunks of games and when we looked back and looked at how things operate, if he had played every game on average he would have won the last two best-and-fairests. We have barely had him so effectively he is like another No.1 draft pick. Then there is the big giant in Ivan Soldo, we’re excited to welcome him back. And when I say Dion has had a great pre-season, I reckon Toby (Nankervis) has had a better one. He is looking amazing so there is a lot of real positive signs for us that we didn’t have last year. Toby Nankervis missed a large amount of footy, Dion Prestia barely played, Kane Lambert barely played, Ivan didn’t play, so we are really excited about what these guys are going to bring to the table.

What is Dimma planning for veteran star Trent Cotchin? Picture: Michael Klein

What do you do with Trent Cotchin this year?

We would like to investigate some things in the games coming up. He is that good at what he does, it’s hard to take away his strength but also we want other players to step in and grow in the role as well. We want to give Riley Collier-Dawkins the opportunity and Jack Ross the same, these sorts of players are the future. The most exciting part about the Richmond Football Club is its future, that’s what keeps us all going and we keep looking to the next batch of guys who are going to take us where we need to go.

Great players do what they do. We went through some vision with our players about Richmond men and what it looks like. We showed the games, and finals in particular, where at halftime we have been down and then the very first play Cotchin sets the scene. There was a game against Geelong, we were down at halftime and he won a hard ball get. The third quarter was really important in that 2017 Grand Final, he got touch on a guy, smothered the ball, the ball goes down our way for shot on goal. Those are the things great players do and great leaders do, it’s not the kicks, marks and handballs, in the modern game anyone can do that, but it is the hard and tough things that make him the player he is.

Former Carlton coach David Teague has joined your coaching ranks. What does he bring?

He is bloody good and sometimes coaching is bloody tough. I look at Teaguey and he is a senior coach, there is no question in my book, and sometimes the situation just doesn‘t go well for you. He deserves another opportunity and already he has been wonderful for us. I’m blessed to have got a great coaching staff, Adam Kingsley is a senior coach in waiting and we were very lucky to hold onto him. He was right in the mix for two jobs and was stiff not to get both, to be honest. He is probably the best I have worked with, Adam, and I have worked with some really, really good coaches so it’s only a matter of time for him.