Australian Eastern Standard Tiger Time

There are just so many quickly cobbled together stats that I don’t know where to start. That we are one of only six clubs who have played finals the last two years? That the last time we played consecutive finals series Gough Whitlam was Prime Minister? That this is the first time since 1977 we will play finals and Carlton won’t. I’m sure there is more that will come out progressively throughout the week but they are pretty good starting points.

My favourite though is that Nick Vlastuin knows one consistent thing in his playing time at Richmond, finals.

I was lucky enough to be in attendance on Saturday afternoon, and I really do consider that a privilege. When Dusty lost Ted Richards (of all people) on the turn and ran directly at the Richmond throng behind the goals I can’t remember being happier (don’t tell my other half). Don’t talk to me about five goal leads, that moment was when I started to believe. Sure enough, Sam Reid wrenched us all back in crippling doubt about a minute later but when have Richmond ever made things easy?

I love Richo, we all love Richo, but unwittingly he gave a reasonable insight into why we’ve been rancid for too long when commentating last weekend and having a laugh about Greg Stafford taking his GPS in the car up Punt Road instead of pre-season running. It was a good yarn but that’s not really all that long ago and Greg Stafford was on reasonable coin. Somewhere in the 2002-2006 timeframe (hardly our halcyon days), our number one ruckman couldn’t be arsed with a running session. This was a time when Brisbane were taking professionalism to another level, Port shook the choke tag for their first flag and West Coast and Sydney played two of the best grand finals that we’ll ever see. Richo makes up for it in this video though, which I’ll watch at least another ten times before the week is out.

So when Ivan Maric talks about the Richmond way ‘that we want to play each week, but it’s also the Richmond way how you conduct yourself down the street with fans, your family and friends, and even just a stranger that you walk by’, it’s spine tingling for me. Even if things go pear shaped on Sunday afternoon, terms like the Richmond way have meaning for the first time in my life. No other Richmond squad in my lifetime was winning that game of football, not 95, 01 or 13.

They left a few in the change rooms, but Sydney are proud. When Dan Hannebery (can play) kicked a goal and did the jumper chest thump that showed everyone they weren’t screwing around. Unless you are Brad Green, the jumper chest thump means something, it means that at that moment of that game, you will do anything to win. When Dan Hannebery is doing the jumper chest thump, best you bring your a-game.

Enough has been written and spoken about Alex Rance’s performance that I don’t need to add anything, but I’m going to anyway. How often have you sat back and admired players like Akermanis, Bartel, Pendlebury, Brown, Franklin and Judd as they’ve singled handedly carried their team over the line when they needed it most? When it needed to be done otherwise there was no next week. For the first time since 1995 and Matthew Knights, we have that story. What a performance. He had some mates who I will touch on very shortly, but without Alex Rance West Coast would be playing on Sunday, not Richmond. He took his opponent, Tippett, right out the match but made sure that no entry was getting past, Gandalf style. It was amazing to watch.

As mentioned, he had some mates and funnily quite a few of them had something in common. Maric was a colossus, Grigg much more influential down back in the second half that he is getting credit for, Miles a clearance machine, Houli calm in defence and constructive in building assault after assault off half back, Gordon crucial in defending the spread as pointed out by the RTT lads and Chaplin was reliable as ever (the first half of the season didn’t happen) as Rance’s sidekick. It reminds you of that baseball book where a team is rock bottom in a season before being dragged over the line by strategically chosen recruits undervalued by other teams. Why don’t the Herald Sun footy journos ever make that connection?

The home grown lads were reasonable as well I suppose. Hannebery probably shaded him in the end, but our first half lead was pretty closely correlated with the skipper’s output, Deledio’s extraordinary second half of the season continued and he’s Sunday away from silencing those lingering ‘big game’ doubts, Ellis again performed at a level far beyond anyone else taken in the bumper 2011 draft, Griff took the game on in the first quarter and helped set up the five goal insurance cover before taking a clutch grab at the end, Dusty had a stinker but he still managed to leave Richards sprawled on the turf while he ran in for the sealer, Grimes and Batchelor continue to help hold things together, Titch’s possession tally continued at a level where his creativity can be shown for all to see, Newy was very often the last guy in a desperate handball chain out, Foley threated to terrorise them when he snuck forward, Vlastuin and Conca were busy, Petterd had a game to forget but hurt a couple of blokes along the way which I don’t mind and a certain bloke called Riewoldt managed four clutch goals (more than a fifth of all goals kicked on the day) against arguably the best defence of the last decade. I could go all Tolstoy on Rance but people tell me that the Internet is filling up and I like the Internet so I won’t.

This is all made even better by the fact that as I type, right this very second, world war three is breaking out at a gym named after whoever sponsors Collingwood this week and Eddie is pleading for peace. Somewhere along this magnificent nine weeks we even managed to get The Age’s chief grump RoCo on board, probably around the exact time his web people told him that a semi competent Richmond could well save journalism and based on flight prices right now, maybe QANTAS should have held off on their financial announcement for a week.

This time last year, Ross Lyon simply shrugged off the fact that Fremantle had to travel down to Geelong. Today, Port Adelaide threw every single toy out of the cot over not being allowed to wear their ‘traditional’ home jumper that they’ve had since 2010 and was designed by a seven year old. That doubled with Boak’s comments about Chaplin (which must have seemed like a free hit at the time but are now another example of why players generally stick to clichés) and all of a sudden this seems to be the final of public interest. Which is fair enough because Hawthorn will brain Geelong, Fremantle and Sydney are very good but exceptionally boring football teams and other than the few remaining #standbyhird crew, people got sick of Essendon long ago and last time I checked North are still coached by Brad Scott.

There is just so much cool content bouncing around following Saturday and, if you are reading this, you’ve probably already read or watched them multiple times, but just in case:

The last two minutes (two days later it’s still squeaky bum time)

Robbo’s Rance love in

The ABC’s montage of the streak

A really cool piece on Sam Lane on how we are leading the pack on gender equality

And a piece by Chris over at TTBB (nice guy, have met) on his experience of what was a truly amazing day at the footy, don’t just read it – buy a tshirt as well.

Let that not be the last of 2014, let #tigertime continue.

Very late addition, this is how good this streak is. Read Demonblog as well by the way, incredible story teller.

Votes

5: Alex Rance
4: Shaun Grigg
3: Brett Deledio
2: Jack Riewoldt
1: Ivan Maric

Leaderboards

The Benny

36: Brandon Ellis

31: Trent Cotcin

27: Dustin Martin and Jack Riewoldt

23: Alex Rance

22: Brett Deledio

17: Anthony Miles

14: David Astbury and Bachar Houli

13: Shaun Hampson

11: Shane Edwards, Troy Chaplin and Ricky Petterd

10: Daniel Jackson

8: Shaun Grigg

6: Steven Morris, Matt Thomas and Ty Vickery

5: Nathan Foley and Ivan Maric

4: Sam Lloyd and Dylan Grimes

3: Ben Griffiths

2: Nick Vlastuin, Nathan Foley and Chris Newman

1: Orren Stephenson, Matthew Dea, Nathan Gordon and Ben Lennon

Blair Hartley Appreciation Award

17: Anthony Miles

14: Bachar Houli

13: Shaun Hampson

11: Ricky Petterd and Troy Chaplin

8: Shaun Grigg

6: Matt Thomas

5: Ivan Maric

1: Orren Stephenson and Nathan Gordon

Anthony Banik Best First Year Player

4: Sam Lloyd

1: Ben Lennon

Joel Bowden’s Golden Left Boot

14: Bachar Houli

11: Troy Chaplin

8: Shaun Grigg

Greg Tivendale Rookie Medal

17: Anthony Miles

6: Matt Thomas

1: Orren Stephenson

Championship belt:

Incumbent	Winner	Streak	Wins
NA	Cotchin	1	1
Cotchin	Astbury	1	1
Astbury	Riewoldt	1	1
Riewoldt	Astbury	1	2
Astbury	Petterd	1	1
Petterd	Ellis	1	1
Ellis	Conca	1	1
Conca	Martin	1	1
Martin	Riewoldt	1	2
Riewoldt	Martin	1	2
Martin	Martin	2	3
Martin	Miles	1	1
Miles	Martin	1	4
Martin	Cotchin	1	2
Cotchin	Rance	1	1
Rance	Houli	1	1
Houli	Deledio	1	1
Deledio	Deledio	2	2
Deledio	Miles	1	2
Miles	Cotchin	1	3
Cotchin	Riewoldt	1	3
Riewoldt	Rance	1	2

Friendly reminder (that I didn’t think I’d have to give this year) that finals votes count for double so everything bar the Tivendale is still in play.