RICHMOND coach Damian Hardwick was pleased to see "the fabric" of his side return in its upset win over reigning premiers Geelong on Friday night.
"I'm just proud of our footy club overall," Hardwick said post-game.
"We asked some guys to play some foreign roles and they've stepped up and they've executed.
TIGERS v CATS Full match coverage and stats
"That's the most pleasing thing and I thought our leaders have been great, just the way they've continued to promote the positive messages that we've been trying to portray and they've done a wonderful job of keeping the energy up."
The Tigers' leaders put the Cats to the sword, with Dustin Martin, Trent Cotchin and Jack Riewoldt combining for nine important goals, as they left the new guard to battle it out at the contest.
Despite a tough start to the season with just two wins and a draw from eight games coming into the weekend, the coach's belief has never wavered.
"I certainly have got a lot of belief, and I think the playing group is starting to feel that little heartbeat coming back. It looked Richmond-like, there were dirty goals, the way we got the ball to ground, the way we charged in… that's a Richmond game that the fabric of our footy club has been built on for a number of years and we're starting to see that come back into the playing group."
It wasn't wholly positive for the Tigers, however, with Jacob Hopper subbed out in the third quarter with a left calf injury, which Hardwick confirmed would mean some weeks out of the game for the recruit.
For Geelong, Chris Scott was upbeat despite the loss. For the first time in 77 games the Cats were the younger side, and it gave the coach a chance to see what the future of the club looks like.
"The young players in our team give us great reason for optimism, so I'm pretty philosophical about it," Scott said.
Geelong kicked five goals and 11 behinds in the opening half to give Richmond the lead, with the uncharacteristic poor conversion a talking point.
"This is not saying Richmond had good luck, but I just thought we had some bad luck sometimes, just rub of the green didn't go our way, the bounce of the ball, that sort of thing.
"But if you get a little more sophisticated than that and you look at the players in our team, Ratugolea's played every game but he's still a new player to our team, certainly in that position, and he was fantastic. I thought Bruhn was good, I thought Jhye Clark when he came on, we got to see little patches of what he's going to be.
"There's a lot that we'll take away from the game and be positive about."
When asked about the umpiring, Scott was diplomatic and amiable.
"What are you allowed to say? You're allowed to disagree… you win some, you lose some and sometimes it does feel like it's going against you, but I'll watch a game tomorrow and I won't notice it because I don't have a dog in the fight," Scott said.
The Cats coach is optimistic about getting several players back from injury in the coming weeks, including captain Patrick Dangerfield, pressure forward Tyson Stengle and premiership defender Jack Henry all possibilities for next week's match against Fremantle.
