RICHMOND announced a four-man leadership group yesterday, drawing on two players who arrived at the club as rookies, one plucked from the draft pool in his year at a lowly No. 55 and a fourth who was that year's best player.

Such is leadership and football, the method of arrival at a club is only a suggestion of value. The new captain, Chris Newman, was the club's pick 55. An unremarkable player in many ways — average height, build and speed — he was another honest type pressing his case in the game.

What elevated him and made him a remarkable player was his capacity to play the game, and play it in a manner that galvanises a team.

As coach Terry Wallace observed yesterday, Newman was named the new captain because he embodied what it was the club considered itself to be and how it wanted to be regarded and led. "We think Chris sets the example of how we want the game to be played at the Richmond footy club," Wallace said. "He is hard-nosed, has a strong approach, he will always put his head over the football (and) when it is pressure times in games you can always rely on Chris to do the right thing."

It is trite and somewhat disingenuous in the multimillion-dollar world of modern football to refer to the working-class origin of clubs and the roots it retains in its heritage, but doubtless Newman is a player referencing the club's history. He will wear Jack Dyer's number and while he is unlikely to wear quite the same opposition blood on his boots, he has already worn sufficient of his own.

Newman suffered a sickening broken leg in 2006, which at the time left him wondering if he would play again, let alone captain the side. "I've thought about that, and I would never have imagined it. If someone would have said at the start of my career eight years ago that I'd be captaining the Richmond Football Club, I probably would have laughed," Newman said.

"But as I said, it's a huge step, and it's a role that I'm not taking lightly."

He was chosen ahead of last year's vice-captain Nathan Foley, who was taken as a rookie by the Tigers after being on Melbourne's rookie list. Kelvin Moore, who was named along with Brett Deledio as the players to flesh out the Tigers' four-man leadership group, was also at Melbourne before being rookie-listed by the Tigers.