Tylar Young could hardly have been more impressive in his return to senior football with Richmond against Essendon at the MCG on Saturday night.

The tall, mobile defender, who was playing his first game at AFL level for 14 months following an ACL injury, produced a top-class performance across the Tigers’ backline.

He finished with 18 disposals, eight marks, six rebound-50s, eight intercepts and 331 metres gained in the team’s hard-fought, nine-point win.

“Been a long time...just so glad to be out there doing what I love,” Young told Richmond Media in a post-match interview.

“It’s a long time doing an ACL. Sometimes you go, 'am I going to get back', but I feel like I’ve come back fitter, stronger.”

An impressive feature of Young’s display was his intercept marking.

“It was something I wanted to work on,” he said.

“I used to want to sort of spoil everything. So, try and change my game to intercept and help out the other boys.

“I just want to be reliable with the back seven. They can look at me and know that I’m going to get the job done.

“So, hopefully I did that.”