The Buzz: Richmond star Jack Riewoldt must get on with playing good footy Richmond star Jack Riewoldt has mixed his form during the first five weeks of the season. Picture: Wayne Ludbey Source: The Australian JACK Riewoldt plays his football as if the world is against him. His running battle with the umpires barely ceases, he plays for free kicks just a little too often, and his body language guarantees he is the centre of attention. When the dual Coleman Medallist is flying for marks and dominating opponents it is just the fun of the fair, theatrics which guarantee the spectacle is enhanced. But when Richmond loses a critical game by less than a goal - and Riewoldt kicks a solitary goal - it becomes way more than a sideshow. Riewoldt the Great has turned into Petulant Jack again, and it's time for his coach and fellow leaders to pull him back into line. He play-acted, bayed for frees and generally acted the fool on Friday night. But the bigger problem was he refused to fly for marks or lead up at the ball, content to let an elite opponent in Luke McPharlin - and the fact he was outnumbered by Docker defenders - ruin his day. Twice in the last 96 seconds of the game, with Richmond searching for the match-winning goal, he was outmarked or failed to bring the ball to ground. If he busted a gut and got rolled by a better player then so be it, but the theatrics made you feel he was content to wait for another day and an easier opponent. It mirrored his performance against the Western Bulldogs, when he kicked three of his five goals in junk time, was defended against claims he was "petulant" by Damien Hardwick and somehow got a vote from one of the two coaches. Triple premiership forward and former Carlton captain Mark Maclure was particularly blunt on the weekend. Jack Riewoldt. Fair dinkum. What a prima donna. It's about time he actually stood up himself and did something," was Maclure's assessment. The Buzz went to Maclure again yesterday in search of a remedy and he raised a comparison that should stop Riewoldt's silliness in its tracks. It has to be fixed by his peers. That's his biggest problem. Are they strong enough to control him? ... He is totally in control of that club. (Brett) Deledio and (Trent) Cotchin have to handle this bloke. They have to change this guy and they have to make him one of them, because at the moment he's not," Maclure said. He reminds me of someone else I know. This is the path they go along and it all ends in tears. Seven years on we are still seeing this. That's the syndrome of a poor club, and Carlton were a poor club when it happened with (Brendan) Fevola. And it reflects on coaching staff, management and the players. Riewoldt only has to rewind five weeks to turn this latest episode full circle. The man, who in 2010 flipped the bird against Hawthorn and berated his own teammates, was lauded for a 0.4 game in which he selflessly led into space. Then he starred with seven goals against St Kilda, repeatedly jumping at the ball whether the Sherrin stuck or not. Maclure says Riewoldt needs to be more selfless when an opponent is on top, or believes Richmond will never achieve true success. The players have got to pull him in and say, 'Come with us, or we are going to cut you free.' They will never win one the way he is going. Who does he kick his goals against? Against the s--- clubs. He is a flat track bully who doesn't kick them against the big teams. (Against McPharlin) he didn't go at the ball. You have to open up space, and that was Jack's job. He had to take opponents away from (Tyrone) Vickery and instead he blued when people didn't kick it on his chest. You don't see Tom Hawkins, or Harry Taylor, or James Podsiadly carrying on like that, because they come from an elite club and an elite culture. It's time for Riewoldt to forget the distractions and take on the Cats on Saturday night in what is a huge game for his side. Bulldog Brett Goodes in action. SEEN a bloke called Brett Goodes play? He kicks it like a dream, gets physical at every opportunity, and altogether looks like he is making up for the decade of AFL football denied him through various circumstances. If there was ever a pin-up boy for the mid-season draft, the Western Bulldogs footballer is it. In a week where Adelaide's premiership hopes went one ugly snap of Tex Walker's anterior cruciate ligament, discussion about the mid-season draft has again been raised. Yet why does the AFL continue to pay lip service to the notion, floating it sporadically yet never fully committing, when it seems such a no-brainer? As recently as this year's equalisation talks the option of a mid-season trade or draft period was raised by the AFL as one way of keeping teams even. Yet the salary cap ramifications of trading highly-paid ageing stars for the trade of an early draft picks or 21-year-old kids immediately puts the kybosh on the trade option. How could Collingwood or Hawthorn afford to replace an injuried star with another from a lowly-placed club mid-year: it just can't work. When the Buzz went asking clubs about the potential for the mid-season draft raised in those equalisation talks just days later. most clubs couldn't even remember it being mentioned. It seems it is a perennial distraction thrown around at times when attention is turned to other more nefarious subjects. So how could the mid-season draft actually work in the AFL, as distinct from some ambit claim that drags in radio talk-back callers. The AFL does allow clubs to hold open one rookie spot on their list until the end of the pre-season, then fill it for a need. But clubs almost never take up the option, aware that player must train with them all summer without even the promise of a spot on a rookie list. Most clubs don't know by March that all three of their ruckmen will fall over, or that one star forward will leave in a blaze of salary-cap cheating and the other will do his ACL, neither of them to be adequately replaced. The only way the mid-season draft would work is if each of the 18 clubs could add one player to their list from a state league in around June each season if the need arose. It would work for a team like Collingwood, aware that as much as they will try to paper over holes they have no player on their list to fill the small defender role of Alan Toovey. It would allow Adelaide to consider the best SANFL prospect already overlooked if they felt that player was a better fit than Shaun McKernan, Walker's nominal backup. Think of the romance of a player like Andrew Krakouer, setting the WAFL afire in 2010, being injected into an AFL team destined for glory. Or what it would do for the standard in any of those state-based competitions if the prize for domination could be mid-season elevation to the big time. If only one player was available per team, it would not ravage the state-based leagues of talent but rather add a frisson of excitement to weekly proceedings. What if a club so desperate for forward options and with a coach on the brink of survival plucked Brendan Fevola from bush footy in desperation? It might be totally outlandish, but in a sporting realm that dines out on rags-to-riches sagas, the AFL has that epic sagas in short supply. James Podsiadly, Michael Barlow, Orren Stephensen, Alex Silvagni, Nick Duigan, Sam Rowe, Nick Kommer, Aaron Davey and more could all have been plucked a year or more early from their state-based leagues.