DEAN Towers made a mistake by ignoring a short pass to Lance Franklin in the dying minutes of the Sydney Swans' loss to Richmond, coach John Longmire admits.

But Longmire said on Monday it was just one of several bad decisions his side made against the Tigers, and they all combined to cost the team four points.

Rich v Syd: Full match coverage and stats

Towers took possession of the footy on centre wing with 53 seconds left in the game and his side leading by five points, but chose not to chip it sideways to Franklin in a move that would have taken more time off the clock and almost certainly assured the Swans of victory.

Instead, he bombed the ball inside the Swans' forward 50, where Richmond won possession and transferred the ball to the other end, allowing Sam Lloyd to mark and then goal after the siren to record a famous win.

Longmire acknowledged that Towers should have taken the Franklin option.

"Yeah, he probably should have," Longmire said.

"But there was probably a few other things that should have gone right that didn't as well, and to be fair we usually get those things right.

"It was just a lot of little things that add up to one big thing and we'll sit down as a team and look at it and discuss it as we normally do. 

"It's just a reminder that you need to do everything well all the time and when you don't get it quite right, you rely on luck.

"Luck doesn't hurt and the bounce of the ball doesn't hurt, but you don't want to rely upon it.

"We didn't get it right on the weekend and it's just a reminder that if you don't get every little thing right, you can get bitten very quickly."

The Swans' star-studded midfield – Dan Hannebery and Kieren Jack aside – had a rare quiet night against Richmond, compounding the loss of Josh Kennedy on Friday with a hamstring issue. 

Luke Parker (20 possessions) and Tom Mitchell (16) were well held by the Tigers, but Longmire said he was far from worried by the output of the onballers, who have been in outstanding touch so far in 2016.

"They're normally a pretty consistent crew," he said.

"We normally get a bit more consistency across that whole midfield group and particularly with Josh (Kennedy) not being there we really needed that, and didn't quite get it.

"We're really confident they'll be right and they'll bounce back.

"We've got some quality people in that part of the ground and they've been pretty good for quite a while."

Kennedy pulled up sore from last Thursday's training session and missed the Richmond clash, but Longmire said the dual club champion trained on Monday without pain and was hopeful he would be back to face his old club Hawthorn in a massive Friday night clash at the MCG.

"He was really close (to playing) on the weekend," Longmire said.