\n Nick Vlastuin continues to make a strong case for an All-Australian spot this season.\n <\/p>\n
\n By Tony Greenberg, Richmond Media\n <\/p>\n
Star Richmond defender Nick Vlastuin is making a compelling case for an inaugural All-Australian blazer this year.<\/p>\n
Vlastuin has displayed excellent form right throughout the 2025 season, but he lifted his game to an even higher level in yesterday\u2019s clash with Collingwood at the MCG.<\/p>\n
He was outstanding across the Tigers\u2019 backline over the course of the four quarters against the premiership favourite, finishing the match with 25 disposals, an equal game-high and AFL career-high 14 contested possessions, seven marks, game-high eight rebound-50s, four score involvements, game-high and career-high 17 intercepts, three tackles and 472 metres gained.<\/p>\n
Those 17 intercepts also were the most by any player in the competition this season, highlighting just how impressive Vlastuin\u2019s performance was.<\/p>\n
In all 19 games so far this season, the 31-year-old veteran of 252 games with Richmond is averaging 20.0 disposals, 6.2 contested possessions, 6.2 marks, 5.7 rebound-50s, 7.7 intercepts and 389.7 metres gained per match.<\/p>\n
He is ranked second in the competition for intercepts and seventh for rebound-50s.<\/p>\n
Richmond coach Adem Yze paid a glowing tribute to Vlastuin in his post-match media conference.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s been terrific all year. In tough conditions out there, it was slippery, but the ball looked dry every time when it was around his area,\u201d Yze said.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s such an important part of not only our team, but the way that we play, and the leadership that he provides our younger boys out there.<\/p>\n
\u201cSitting on the bench beside him and listening to the conversations that he\u2019s having with our players down there, it\u2019s just fast-tracking the development of our younger players, which is enormous.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Nick Vlastuin continues to make a strong case for an All-Australian spot this season. By Tony Greenberg, Richmond…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":26148,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[560],"tags":[638,64,63,55,639,85,83],"class_list":["post-26147","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-afl","tag-afl","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-australian-football-league","tag-australianfootballleague","tag-sports","tag-text"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26147","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=26147"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26147\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/26148"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26147"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26147"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26147"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}