The AFL media guide says he was born on March 19, 1975, which makes him 33.
However - he seems to have been around forever, but when you see him on the track, he runs around like a teenager.
He moved into a new role last year, moving out of the forward 50 to have free rein over the entire ground, and while he was troubled by a knee injury, he went within a solitary BOG of claiming the Brownlow Medal.
Coach Terry Wallace admitted there was only one way to hold back the huge utility.
“Well, you’re never going to stop him, whether that’s on the training track or game day, from doing what he does naturally,” Wallace admitted in the lead-up to Richmond’s clash with Collingwood on Thursday night.
“The answer to that is that what you have to do is restrict his ground time through the pre-season period, and we’ll do that along the way.”
It’s even possible Richardson could miss the clash with Collingwood.
“We haven’t finalised (the team) – we’ll sit back and have a look.
“The structure of it is we pick 29 players and we’ll probably pick him in that and see how he pulls up and how he’s going.
“We’re rotating – we left three or four key players out of round one on purpose, and those blokes will probably play (rounds) two, three and four.
“We’ll leave three or four out of NAB two, for the same sort of reason, and we’ll flow that through into NAB three and four, regardless of where we’re at.”
Wallace said the big crowd expected for Thursday night was an incentive to play some kids.
“A few of the boys who played in round one won’t play in round two – you need to have that opportunity to still be able to develop a few of your younger boys as well.
“And just because the build-up around the game is big, and there’s going to be a big crowd there, that’s even more reason for me to be wanting to play a couple of our development players, so that they learn and understand what the game’s all about at that level.”
Former skipper Kane Johnson and defender Jordie McMahon are both likely to play this week after being rested against Fremantle.
Dream Team watch – Matthew Richardson is rated a $434,600 midfielder/forward in Toyota AFL Dream Team 2009.
