Proud 200-gamer Richardson wants more Tigers glory

HE achieved everything and more he could have imagined in a dream first six years of his WAFL career before taking a year off, but Claremont captain Ian Richardson is as motivated as ever for more team success as he becomes the ninth Tiger to 200 games.

Richardson reaches the 200-game mark with Claremont this Saturday at Claremont Oval against West Perth and by doing so joins fellow Tigers David Crawford (200), Les Mumme (206), Wayne Harvey (217), Lorne Cook (229), Kevin Clune (231), Graham Moss (254), Ken Caporn (273) and Darrell Panizza (274).

It’s yet another accomplishment in a glittering career from the hard-leading, long kicking left-footed half forward who has assumed the captaincy in 2018 trying to lead Claremont back to some of the success he was part of over the opening six years of his career.

With 199 games under his belt for Claremont to go with a career that includes 385 goals, six appearances representing Western Australia, a Simpson Medal, a fairest and best award, two leading goalkicker awards and two premierships, there’s plenty to be proud of too.

“My first year I was in the senior squad was 2007 and I was playing reserves the whole year and couldn’t crack it for a league game, and that drove me a little bit harder to break in,” Richardson said.

“I made my debut Round 1 the next year and luckily haven’t been dropped since and have only missed a couple of games through injury. I never take my position for granted and am proud to play for Claremont every week and want to keep that going.

“I haven’t really thought about the milestone too much until this week and it is obviously a pretty good achievement and something I’m very proud of,” Richardson added.

“I also got to meet a lot of the other 200-game players from Claremont this week and a lot of the older boys were very proud of me. That showed how much it meant to them and how much it means to me now. I’m very proud of it.”

Richardson burst on to the scene in 2008 with Claremont adding life to the forward-line coming off the shock 2007 Grand Final loss to Subiaco, with the Tigers left flat after a third loss on the big day in the past four years.

What he delivered immediately was remarkable. While Claremont struggled in 2008, Richardson didn’t and had a remarkable rookie season kicking 62 goals including three hauls of seven.

He starred in the WAFL State Team’s win over Queensland in Townsville, winning the Simpson Medal booting five goals. He went on to win Claremont’s fairest and best and leading goalkicker awards too.

Richardson continued to star kicking another 46 goals in 2009, 59 in 2010, 41 in 2011, 52 in 2012 and 50 in 2013 while playing State football for WA in each of those seasons but it was the team success he was most proud to be part of.

Following difficult 2008 and 2009 seasons, Claremont would go on to dominate the league from 2010 through to the end of 2013. In that four-year period, the Tigers won four straight minor premierships and had a record of 69-18 (with one draw).

There was heartbreak along the way though. They lost one of the great WAFL Grand Final to Swan Districts by a point in 2010 having beaten them by 50 points in the second semi-final.

Then they ran out of steam late in 2013 despite a dominant season losing finals at home to West Perth and East Perth to bow out in straight sets.

They won the 2011 and 2012 premierships in between, though, and they remain the highlight of Richardson’s career but that whole four-year period really was such a pleasure to be part of.

“I hadn’t played in any of those previous Grand Final losses until the Swans one when we had been minor premiers and had beaten them convincingly in the semi-final,” he said.

“That was heartbreaking and it’s hard to ignore everyone calling us chokers and how we’ll never win a Grand Final. But we were determined to prove them wrong and we all worked hard in 2011 to get back there again. To finally get over the line and prove everyone wrong is something I’ll remember forever.

“We didn’t want to be one-hit wonders either. We wanted to prove that we could do it for a sustained period and won another one in 2012 and they were both definitely the highlights of my career.

“We had another good year in 2013 but unfortunately couldn’t quite get to the Grand Final that year but from 2010-2013 was a period where we had a lot of wins and it was a lot of fun to play in.”

After playing 130 games up until the end 2013 after starting in 2008, Richardson took a break to travel in 2014 and Claremont’s fortunes suffered after those dominant four years and they haven’t quite been back in the premiership race since.

But Richardson sees no reason why this current group can’t make a run at success with Anton Hamp and Haydn Busher holding down the defence, Jye Bolton and Kane Mitchell leading the way through the middle and a dangerous forward-line that includes himself and Tom Lee.

He certainly feels the current coaching staff will give them every chance led by Darren Harris, who he rates as the best coach he’s played under which is saying something considering that group includes Roger Kerr, Simon McPhee, Marc Webb and Michael Broadbridge.

“I’m really confident that this group is on the right track. The main thing is that the coaching staff is as awesome. Harro is easily the best coach I’ve played under in my career, he’s just a really good bloke and people person, and motivator,” Richardson said.

“We’ve got great assistant coaches too with Craig White, Andrew Embley, Geoff Valentine, Kepler Bradley and Steve Armstrong. They really pull the boys into line and show them the way. The playing group is definitely starting to click.