What Is Taylor Duryea Actually Responsible for Developing in Richmond’s Young Defenders?

Richmond can point to Josh Gibcus, Luke Trainor, Campbell Gray, Tom Brown and other defensive pieces and reasonably talk about upside. But potential does not become a backline simply because Jake Batchelor has names to arrange on a whiteboard.

That creates a different accountability question for Taylor Duryea. Batchelor owns the AFL defensive system. Duryea’s development role sits earlier in the chain: what individual defensive capabilities must become dependable enough that Batchelor can ask more of the collective structure?

The distinction matters after an injury-interrupted 2026 made Duryea’s first season difficult to judge cleanly. So what should Richmond actually expect to see in its young defenders in 2027 — in their positioning, aerial decisions, body work, ball use and repeatability — before it can say the development program is giving the senior defence something stronger than promise?

The member feature separates Duryea’s job from Batchelor’s, tests what can fairly be judged after 2026, and asks what evidence should begin appearing if Richmond’s young defenders are becoming footballers a system can trust.

Read the full RTSSG investigation here.

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