Richmond AFLW coach Ryan Ferguson never set out to be an AFL player and eventual coach.

Instead, the game found him, and he's been entrenched ever since.

A key defender who played 47 games for Melbourne after being drafted in 2002, it all fell into place as a teenager.

"I didn't see it (football) as a pathway," Ferguson said on Konversations with Konrad.

"I did it out of curiosity to see how far I could go. Could I get on the list? I did that. Could I get a game in the reserves? I did that. A game in the seniors?

"One thing led to another. Rather than have an ambition to play in the AFL, the opportunity presented itself. It wasn't something I ever set out to do."

The ultimate football journeyman, Ferguson was always one who had an itch to lead and help guide others. A teacher by trade, his ability to connect allowed him to flourish into a senior coach.

His journey to Punt Road has also led him back to old Demons teammate, Adem Yze, who Ferguson spent the majority of his playing days with.

And Yze's leadership on field during his Melbourne career of 271 games was something Ferguson noticed straight away.

"He was a very instinctive player. Skilful. When you look back, it's easy to piece it together, you go, 'oh, with these traits, why wouldn't he have ended up a coach?'," he said.

"Another thing that still sits with me from that time in retrospect, is his ability to connect with any player on the list. 

"When you think about coaching now, he connects with a wide range of ages and different characteristics and different people, and his ability to respect people for who they are. That makes sense."

The former Demon would finish his AFL career and begin a successful SANFL career with West Adelaide, before a move back to Melbourne saw him take up a role as a Richmond development and VFL line coach.

During Covid, Ferguson was let go by Richmond, due to staff and coaching cuts across the league. Little did he know, he'd be led straight back into the Swinburne Centre to take up a newly formed role a year later, but with a completely different program.

"There was a lot of unknown. Luckily, I did have teaching to fall back on, so I just went straight back into teaching. There were still people with needs that needed people off campus," he said.

"Neil Balme then mentioned, 'hey, I reckon there'd be an opportunity with the women's team and I reckon you'd be a really good candidate to put your hand up'.

"It sounds a bit weird, I'd just been sacked, and now I'm going to apply for a job at the same Club in a different program. But the more I thought of it, the more excited I got at the challenge of taking over a team that's very much at the start of their journey.

"That's right up my alley, building something from the ground up. I thought, 'this could be outstanding' and jumped into that straight away."

Now, Ferguson has led Richmond's AFLW team since 2021. Last year, it included a finals berth.

But to get there took some time, with the coach working through taking over a program within a competition that was so new and foreign to his footballing expertise.

"Such was the thirst for knowledge and diligence to want to be better, and how can we fast track that," Ferguson said.

"It was just on a journey of wanting to get better quick (for the players). That is brilliant, but it is a challenge, because we do have to scaffold and build sustainably.

"It was a lot about building the culture in the early days."

Richmond head to Darwin on Friday night to take on Essendon in the highly-anticipated Dreamtime clash.