RICHMOND coach Terry Wallace says it's far too early to be declaring teams currently out of the eight to be out of finals contention.

After nine rounds, the Tigers are 11th with three wins and a draw and while Wallace insists that finals are not a topic at Punt Road he says it is too soon to declare clubs dead and buried.

"I think absolutely, considering you've got one of the grand finalists from last year outside of that," he said, referring to Port Adelaide.

"I think it sells papers, and there's always a lot of discussion and talk about things – and it has us talking about it here today, so it's working, clearly – but sides can get on a roll where they win five or six games in a row, sides can get injuries, there's a lot of things that happen in this competition.

"So to say that a side is two games clear of another side so it's all over – I find that more paper talk than anything else."

And there's no talk of September – be it finals or holidays – down at Tigerland.

"We honestly haven't spoken about it at all, and won't. I mean, we're just working at the moment on continued improvement and just building ourselves as a footy team.

"A couple of those close losses early in the season might come back to bite us later in the year, but they're done now."