Richmond President John O’Rourke has provided an update on where the Club sits heading into Round 8.
The Tigers are searching for their first win of the season in Saturday’s clash with West Coast in Perth.
O’Rourke acknowledges the Club wants to be winning games and doesn’t want to be sitting at the bottom of the ladder, but remains confident Richmond is on the right path.
“I think our supporters are understanding of where we're at,” O’Rourke told the ABC.
“After a successful run, we made some deliberate decisions to say we're probably going to have to take some steps back to be sustainable going forward, and that's the reality of a very tough, equalised competition.
“We don't want to be on the bottom of the ladder. We want to be winning games as quickly as we can, but the reality is you've got to get games into young players, and that's what we're doing, and there's some good signs coming through that, but it's not yet coming through into wins.
“We're doing good things for parts of the game…but just can't sustain it. We've just got to keep at it and work hard and get that development and growth going, and the results will eventually turn, hopefully faster than the pundits think today.”
When explaining what fans speak to O’Rourke about at games, the President said there’s still positivity coming from the Tiger Army.
“I'd say, on the whole, it's positive. I mean, you'll always get the one or two grumpy ones who want things to happen really fast, and we understand that,” O’Rourke said.
“They're paying good money to still come to games, and we're grateful for that, but I think the majority…there's goodwill there because we've been a great Club for a long period of time, but that won't last forever.
“We have the discussions about the injuries, people are concerned about that, when are we going to see Josh Smillie and Taj Hotton and these big draft picks play. We go through that as honestly and as transparently as we can.
“I've got to say, the vibe is still pretty good, the attitude pre-game on Anzac Day Eve was fantastic, we had a good crowd, all of our hospitality functions were well attended, and everyone was up and about.
“I think that's a good sign of a strong, cohesive Club.”
