RICHMOND is unsure if skipper Trent Cotchin will be back before the finals after suffering another hamstring injury on Friday night.
The Tigers skipper left the field midway through the first term of the soggy MCG contest against Collingwood and spent the last 10 minutes of the quarter on the interchange bench.
After the quarter-time huddle, Cotchin embraced coach Damien Hardwick with a hug before returning to the bench and removing his playing jumper and replacing it with a Tigers jacket.
Trent Cotchin has taken off his guernsey and put on a jumper after a hug from coach Damien Hardwick.#AFLPiesTigers pic.twitter.com/bBQ51UsiQ2
— AFL.com.au (@AFLcomau) July 26, 2019
The premiership captain has been restricted to 10 games this season due to two hamstring issues, and the club acknowledged it is a worry with the finals series looming.
Hardwick said the Tigers are hoping he has avoided any serious damage, in what was the only sour point of their strong win over the Magpies.
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"It's disappointing, he's got a little bit of a tweak. We're not too sure of the extent of it, but it's his support leg when he was kicking. We're hoping it will be on the minor side but once again he's had the two incidents this year," Hardwick said post-game.
"It's disappointing to lose players, and Collingwood lost a couple too, so losing players this time of the year is always tough."
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Richmond's win puts it into the top-four on the ladder with four games to go, and then the bye after round 23, before the first week of the finals.
Hardwick said it was too early to tell if Cotchin will feature again before September.
"I'm not too sure. We don't know the significance of the injury," he said.
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Hardwick's comments followed those by Richmond football boss Neil Balme, who ruled out Cotchin for next week's clash with Melbourne.
"(It's) not too bad," Balme said during the game.
"I think he'll miss a bit."