DAMIEN Hardwick has challenged his Richmond charges to get ill-discipline and poor free kicks out of their game after cheap giveaways proved costly in their 33-point loss to St Kilda.
Richmond lost the free kick count 19-28 and both Marlion Pickett and Shai Bolton gave away costly 50-metre penalties at crucial times during Sunday evening's game.
The Tigers had led by 25 midway through the third quarter before St Kilda booted a run of 10 consecutive goals and now sit at 1-2 after three rounds.
SAINTS v TIGERS Full match coverage and stats
"It's disappointing and (especially) the cheapness of some of the free kicks," Hardwick said.
"Just discipline and just too high and the stoppage free kicks hurt us once again.
"We've got to get better. We've spoken about that all year, about trying to eradicate that from our game, but it creeps in at critical stages and it's really, really costly.
"Like you can't defend from a free kick, you can't put pressure on, they get a free disposal. So we've got to get better on that front."
The Tigers also lost the free kick count 20-28 in their round one loss to Carlton.
Hardwick was particularly frustrated with Pickett's silly 50-metre penalty, where as Ben Long lined up for goal from long range, the Tiger shoved Dan Butler to the ground.
The umpire brought Long forward and he converted from the goal square to bring St Kilda within a goal of the Tigers at the final change, and the Saints kicked on from there to win the game.
"At the end of the day I can sit there and talk about it as much as we want but the players have got to sit there and be accountable for their actions like everyone else is," Hardwick said.
"So we've got to get better on that.
"There's some that were 50-50s but there's others where it's just poor technique and we just give away down the field free kicks or the ill-disciplined one like the Marlion one, which is disappointing.
"The guy's having a shot from 50, all of a sudden he's going from the goal square. So that hurts."
The Tigers will await the result of scans on co-captain Dylan Grimes, who was substituted after a third-quarter hamstring injury.
"It's obviously a hamstring and that's disappointing," Hardwick said.
"So he'll miss some time. What that is, we're not too sure."
Meanwhile, Brett Ratten has declared Max King has the ability to turn a game on its head like few others after the 21-year-old exploded for a second straight week to lead the Saints to a comeback victory.
After his rapid-fire three-goal burst in the win over Fremantle last week, King sprung to life in the final term, booting four goals and hauling in six marks to complete the 58-point turnaround.
"Some of the elite players or the very good players of the competition have the ability to change games, whether it's only two possessions, three possessions or 10 and Max is one of those players who can do that," Ratten said.
"He's still growing but he's pretty exciting when he launches at the ball.
"The great thing was he kicked a few big goals to give us a little bit of breathing space.
"Everybody expects Max to do everything every week and he's a young man still developing. But to see glimpses of that and he is a very good player, but he's still building. So it's great to see.
"Some of his attributes, to be 204cm and run around and launch at the footy and do what he does, it's pretty special, but he's still got a lot of growth."
Ratten said it was "good to trial" all of Paddy Ryder, Jack Hayes and Rowan Marshall in the same team, but stopped short on saying he'd repeat the tall line-up.
Jack Higgins was substituted out with concussion after a first-quarter tackle from Hugo Ralphsmith.
But Ratten didn't think there was any additional concerns over Higgins, who had two rounds of brain surgery in 2019, beyond standard concussion protocols.
Ratten also confirmed Jack Billings had a "setback" with his hamstring injury and would miss another 2-3 weeks.
