grudge match with Collingwood late in the year. Although the Tigers struggled badly, Roach tied for fourth place (coincidentally with Brian Taylor) on the VFL's goalkicking table with 80 goals. Had he not missed five games, he may have topped the century again. Roach followed that with 62 goals in 20 games during 1986, but he lost the head-to-head with Taylor, who scored a century for the only time in his career. Roach received Richmond life membership that year. Chronic injury blighted the final three years of Roach's playing career. In 1988, under new coach Kevin Bartlett, Roach played just three games for the year as a defender, and his key forward position was given to youngster Jeff Hogg. It disappointed the Richmond fans to see one of the club's greatest forwards vainly trying to hold back the tide as the opposition booted huge scores against the undermanned Richmond defence. In 1989, his final season, Roach was given seven games to make his 200-game career milestone, and then retired. He remained at the club though, taking up a position as a skills coach. Comparisons Roach's average of 3.03 goals per game rates with the best, but he never placed in the club's best and fairest award. Although player depth is a must for a strong team, the situation with Taylor and Roach competing for the one position ultimately worked against both players and the club. Fatefully for Roach, he was too often played away from full-forward, by far his best position. In the five seasons when he was fit and exclusively the full-forward (1979–1981 and 1985–1986), he scored 430 goals in 102 matches, over four per game. This included ten bags of eight or more goals in a game. He was leading goalkicker for the club seven times and today the club awards the "Michael Roach Medal" to its highest goal scorer for the season. Throughout the 1990s, Roach worked at Punt Road as a specialist coach, was team manager of the reserves and a highly visible figure in the Save our Skins campaign of 1989–1990 that saved the club from bankruptcy. Controversially omitted from Richmond's Team of the Century in 1998, he was inducted into the club's Hall of Fame four years later. All the while he continued to maintain strong links with Richmond, living in the suburb and he had a great thrill when his son Thomas was