Richmond veteran Jack Riewoldt has explained that while the Tigers are still to announce who will lead the club this year, it appears likely a sole candidate will replace Trent Cotchin as captain.
Speaking at Punt Road ahead of Richmond's first match simulation hit out for the summer, the Tasmanian forward alleviated a modicum of ambiguity as to which name would reign alongside head coach Damien Hardwick.
When quizzed as to whether the playing group had come together to find Richmond's latest leader, Riewoldt explained that members of their ambush were yet to head to the ballots.
“No it hasn’t happened yet,” he said with a chuckle.
“At the moment, it’s still just a bit of a process. There’s a core group of senior players that are discussing how we’re going to go about it."
Despite still operating without a playing chief, the 305-game champion claimed that Richmond was likely to employ just one skipper this season rather than opt for co-captains.
“It’s going to be exciting for one player to step into those shoes of the captain of the Richmond Football Club which has obviously been led fantastically well by Trent Cotchin for a long time now," Riewoldt divulged.
Riewoldt also expressed that irrespective of who was tasked with stepping up to the plate would be given the best environment to thrive.
“The one thing I will say with the captaincy is that when that person does get announced, they’ll have a lot of really strong lieutenants around them," the fan-favourite continued.
“If you look at our captaincy model of the last five-years, it’s been two vice-captains and one captain. But the thing people don’t see is that we have a whole horde of players that sit in on all of the meetings and still help make decisions.
“It’s an exciting time for the football club to have a new leader. Whilst it’s sad to see one of the great leaders step down, he won’t be too far away for the person who takes the captaincy role.”
While a date is yet to be set for the polls to open and close, Riewoldt also clued reporters to the fact that members of the playing group were unlikely to be swayed from their current choices.
“We’re not going to learn anything new about any of the leaders and about any of the players over the next period of time," the triple Coleman medallist said.
"If the vote happened today, it would probably still be the same as it would be whenever the vote does take place.”
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With mystery still attached to who is set to follow in the footsteps Dyer, Dean, Bourke and Bartlett, the redheaded spearhead claimed that he would be willing to lead if the buck stopped with him.
“If the club wanted me to do it, I would just step up and do it,” Riewoldt delineated.
“I’ve captained the football club when Trent has been injured, but there are a whole host of factors you’ve got to take into as well. There are some older players, like myself and Shane [Edwards], who are coming towards the end of their careers, do they want to go for a short-term captaincy or do they want to go for someone else who maybe has a three or four or five-year capacity to captain the club?
“It’s a great strength and a great position to be in that we have got three or four options from the demographic of player that we want to select from. We’re very fortunate to be in that position.”
Still, with 2022 acting as the forward's 16th season at AFL level, Riewoldt was willing to concede that his days in boots were nearing their end.
"This may be my last year, and if it is, it is," the out-of-contract veteran revealed.
"You probably know mid-season where you're at in terms of whether you want to go on or not, but all my energy at the moment is going into really enjoying training.
"If this is the last season, then I'm going to really enjoy myself, but I can't put a timeline on it.
"I could have finished up two-years ago [when] there was a few people out there who have wound me up in 2020 and I thought I performed pretty well last year, so what will be will be."
Riewoldt earned AFL life membership last season after surpassing the 300-game milestone and is set to, once again, start his latest campaign when Richmond faces Carlton in Round 1 at the MCG.
