Richmond has a habit of making footy harder than it should be. If they don’t beat Sydney on Saturday they won’t play finals. It doesn’t get harder than that. They won’t beat Sydney.
Richmond will miss the finals.
The Tigers, over the past seven rounds, are the second best performed team in the AFL. In that time, only Sydney has been better. The Swans are on top. They can lose to Richmond and stay on top.
The match is meaningless, from Sydney’s point of view, but that doesn’t mean they will lose.
Richmond is currently eighth. They will miss the finals on percentage to Adelaide or West Coast. The Tigers could finish as low as tenth. They year will be wasted.
Richmond’s last premiership was in 1980. Since then, they have played in the finals four times. Missing the finals is expected. Just missing out by finishing ninth or tenth has become a bad habit.
In 1996, Richmond had to beat North Melbourne in the last round to make the eight. A one-point deficit at three quarter time blew out to 32-points. They finished ninth.
In 1998, Richmond needed to beat Melbourne in the last round to play finals. The 19-point half time margin blew out to 76-points. The Tigers finished ninth.
Richmond needed to thrash Carlton in 2000’s last round to reach September. They lost by 73-points. And finished ninth.
They finished 12th in 2005, just a game and a half outside the eight. In 2006 they finished ninth, two games and huge percentage behind the Western Bulldogs.
The Tigers were ninth again in 2008, just two points behind Collingwood.
So close for Richmond, so many times over so many years. It was better they missed out. They’ve been flaky in and out of September since their last premiership. Last year was no different.
Winning 15 games and finishing fifth was a charade. Plenty of people were disappointed but no one was surprised when they were overrun by Carlton in the elimination final.
That loss left scars.
This year, no one was surprised when the Tigers slumped to 16th after round 14 on the back of four consecutive losses to Essendon (50-points), North (28), Fremantle (20) and Sydney (11).
In Richmond’s favour, those four losses were against teams that will play finals. Aside from Essendon, the Tigers weren’t blown out but they had a 3-11 record.
They haven’t lost since, with seven consecutive wins for the first time since 1995. Notable victories include Port Adelaide (20), West Coast (17), Essendon (18) and Adelaide (10).
The Tigers are in form. Next up is Sydney at Homebush. That will test their form.
If Richmond wins, they will surprise everyone. Victory will earn an away elimination final against Port Adelaide or Fremantle.
When Richmond loses to Sydney, they won’t surprise anyone…
