Despite the barren circumstances of their rebuild, coach Adem Yze is demanding his team has a September mindset as they try to derail rivals' aspirations.
Their next test is the Saturday twilight game against Collingwood, who are 11th and half a game behind 10th-placed North Melbourne in the battle for a wildcard berth.
Just as Yze this week raised eyebrows when he declared Richmond is a destination club for big-name player recruits, he is again by talking up their ability to finish a tough season with better form.
While it is four years since their last finals series and six years since the end of their premiership three-peat, Yze is using the veterans of those glory days to drive high standards at Punt Rd.
"We have a theme around, if it was a preliminary final this weekend, how would our recovery look? What would our training standards look like?," he said on Friday.
"We need our players to be prepared for that.
"Our older players are driving that. They know what it's like, leading into a finals series.
"We don't have the finals carrot, but we can have the right mindset and the right behaviours."
Richmond are coming off an ugly loss to North. The margin was only 25 points, but they scored just six goals in sunny conditions.
"There's a lot to gain and, to be fair, based on last weekend we need to rectify our performance," Yze said.
He is keen to build up the importance of their games for the rest of the season and the Tigers' potential to be a pre-finals fly in the ointment for opponents.
"When we come up against teams fighting for a position in the eight and we get a chance to deny that, I'm going to put that pressure on them," he said.
"We'll be testing ourselves this weekend. We want to put Collingwood into a contest and play with some flair on offence."
Richmond's injury crisis is starting to ease. They will regain Rhyan Mansell and Jack Ross, with several other players making VFL returns.
He said the mood at the club is good and once again spruiked Punt Rd as a potential new home for someone like Port Adelaide star Zak Butters.
"We're a big footy club in the heart of Melbourne," he said.
"When all of those highly talented players (at Richmond) start to play some games of footy together, it's going to be pretty exciting."
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