Richmond coach Damien Hardwick says the self-belief is finally starting to return to Punt Road after the Tigers pulled off yet another come-from-behind victory against interstate opposition at the MCG on Sunday.
For the third time in five weeks the Tigers found themselves behind against non-Victorian opposition at half-time on Sunday - this time against Adelaide - before rallying to score a courageous win, just as they also did against Sydney and Fremantle in recent weeks.
The Tigers, who were being widely tipped not to win a single match in Hardwick's first year as coach after they lost their first nine matches, have now won six matches for the season - against the six non-Victorian teams.
It is the first time Richmond has ever beaten all six non-Victorian clubs in the one season since Port Adelaide joined the AFL in 1997.
And the win came after the young Tigers had begun to look like they were feeling the pinch of a long season in the past fortnight following losses to North Melbourne and Collingwood.
But for Hardwick, the 20-point win over an inaccurate Adelaide on Sunday in a game that ended in a fierce hailstorm, was further proof that the club's dark days - just two finals appearances in the last 28 years - may finally be coming to an end.
"I think our group is starting to get belief and that makes good footy clubs I reckon," he said.
"They now have belief in each other, belief in our (team) structures and the belief in the plan going forward and I think that is why we are becoming a good competitive football side."
And Hardwick warned his young Tigers - the club fielded its ninth first gamer of the season on Sunday in small forward Robert Hicks - would only get better in coming years as they gained more experience.
"We are only going to get better over the course of one, two, three seasons," he said.
"If you look at our experience last week against (ladder leaders) Collingwood (when the Tigers copped an 82 point hiding) it was 50 games on average per play compared to our about 110,120 for Collingwood."
"So once we get two or three more seasons into this squad and add some talent along the way, we have just got to keep hanging tough and do our time on the bottom of the ladder and then eventually the wheel turns."
The most pleasing aspect of Sunday's win for Hardwick was that unlike in earlier victories this season the Tigers did not have to rely on their brilliant young spearhead Jack Riewoldt to kick the bulk of the goals.
Instead Riewoldt, who is now equal on 65 goals with Bulldogs' veteran Barry Hall in the race for this year's Coleman Medal, could only manage two goals against close-checking Crows' defender Ben Rutten yet the Tigers still won thanks to 13 individual goalkickers.
"The evenness of that spread of goalkickers is something most good sides have now," Hardwick said.
"You look at Collingwood and they have always got an array of goalkickers, as have teams like the Bulldogs, and the more we can bring that into our games then the more dangerous we will be and the better player Jack (Riewoldt) will become as a result of that."