Tigers’ special tactics for Cat

RICHMOND has faith in a two-pronged defensive strategy as it prepares for Operation Stop Tomahawk at the MCG tonight.

The two-time Geelong premiership forward is having a career-best season, with seven goals in each of his past two matches to climb to second on the Coleman Medal leaderboard with 48 goals.

But the Tigers are backing defenders David Astbury and Alex Rance to curtail the big man as they vie for a 19th straight win at the home of football.

“He’s in great form, isn’t he?” Richmond coach Damien Hardwick said of Hawkins.

“He’s sort of that beacon down forward and [Daniel] Menzel’s another guy that gets under a lot of sides’ guards. We’ve probably got some players there that we’ll back in with Dave [Astbury] and Alex [Rance] who will play there and around Tom.

“I think he kicked three maybe the last time we played them [in Round 13]. He’s such a great player. He only needs five or six kicks to damage a game. That’s what good players do. We need to pay attention to Tom but also they’ve got some really capable players in that forward part of the ground that can kick goals so it won’t be focused purely on Tom, it will be a team-based approach.”

Tigers midfielder Dion Prestia (ribs) did not train yesterday and will miss the clash, but the club is hopeful he will join fellow premiership players Jack Graham (shoulder) and Bachar Houli (groin) in making the trip north to tackle Gold Coast next weekend.

Despite being exposed last week against Collingwood, Hardwick dismissed concerns over Richmond continuing to play only one ruckman in Tasmanian Toby Nankervis as Ivan Soldo continues to develop in the VFL.

“We feel at this stage we’ll probably just play with the one ruck,” Hardwick said.