What Should Richmond Still Need From Toby Nankervis and Tim Taranto in 2027?

Read the full RTSSG investigation🐯 TIGERS SEASON WRAP — TOUGH NIGHT, BUT PLENTY TO TALK ABOUT, closed Richmond’s 2026 season with a much larger set of questions. This Public companion isolates one of them without answering it for you.

What should Richmond still need from Nankervis and Taranto?

Against Geelong, Toby Nankervis again set a fierce competitive tone, while Tim Taranto finished with 36 disposals and a goal. Those are facts. The harder question is what Richmond should still be asking of two senior leaders when the side around them is supposed to be becoming less dependent on the old core.

Is their value in 2027 best measured by how much football they still carry themselves? Or by how often younger teammates begin to take responsibility beside them?

Which moments should still belong to Nankervis and Taranto? Which moments should no longer have to? And how would supporters recognise that the standards of the senior players are actually spreading through the group rather than remaining concentrated in the same hands?

If Richmond’s younger players improve individually but the hardest moments still fall almost automatically to the same two senior bodies, what would that tell us about the rebuild?

And if their raw numbers fall while the team around them becomes more reliable, would that necessarily mean either veteran has become less valuable?

Those are the questions worth carrying into 2027. What would have to change before Richmond could say responsibility was genuinely spreading through the side — and what evidence would prove it?

Read the full RTSSG investigation

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