Lions are not Tigers’ bunnies: Ah Chee

BRISBANE midfielder Callum Ah Chee is adamant Richmond doesn’t have a psychological hold on the Lions despite the Tigers’ dominance of the Queenslanders.

The Tigers added to an 11year winning streak against the Lions, with their latest success over Brisbane on Tuesday night at Metricon Stadium.

Richmond has lost just once to Brisbane in its past 20 encounters, including 14 wins in a row against a team considered one of its premiership rivals.

The Lions booted themselves out of Tuesday’s game, kicking 4.17 and Ah Chee said that was the concern, not the Tigers’ continued success over them.

“Most of the blokes haven’t been playing since 2009 (when Brisbane last beat Richmond),” Ah Chee said.

“I don’t think that was much of a problem. I think we actually played some pretty good footy, we just needed to finish our work.

“Obviously they (the Tigers) are a fantastic team but if you look at the (statistics), if we finished our work we’re actually pretty close to having a close game with them.”

The Lions are seeking to make amends with an improved goalkicking display when they return to the Gabba on Saturday night to meet the Western Bulldogs.

“We’re going to try to finish off our work,” Ah Chee said.

“That’s something that we want to work on.”

But Ah Chee said the Lions weren’t about to become obsessed with kicking goals.

“It’s just going to be playing our good brand of footy and beating the Western Bulldogs ... we’ll be fine,” he said.

The Lions are set to be boosted by the return of fitagain defenders Daniel Rich and Ryan Lester, and the availability of Daniel McStay (suspended) and Grant Birchall (rested).

“It’ll be good to have some wise heads out there and it’ll be good to see how we go this weekend backing up from a four-day break,” Ah Chee said.

But the Lions will be without Cameron Rayner, who is facing up to a month out after suffering a hamstring strain against the Tigers.