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Adem Yze did his best to stay calm during a wildly fluctuating debut as an AFL head coach, his Tigers rallying from 67 points down to briefly threaten the Suns.

Adem Yze reckons he did well to stop his head from spinning during one of the more rollicking AFL coaching debuts.

The Richmond mentor watched his men kick the first goal then concede the next 11 to a Gold Coast team led by former Tigers coach Damien Hardwick on Saturday.

They trailed by 67 points but then kicked seven straight majors of their own to briefly threaten, eventually falling 14.15 (99) to 9.6 (60).

"I try to pride myself on being calm and composed and to be fair I thought we still were in the box," former Melbourne player Yze said of his head coaching debut.

"We could see what was happening, felt we pulled the right levers and it was just an execution thing.

"That's the game of footy; the season's started now, there will be ups and downs and if we win I don't want to walk in here thinking everything's going well."

Yze was up against the hype of Hardwick and the absence of star trio Dustin Martin, Tom Lynch and Toby Nankervis.

"We went into our shells a bit," he conceded of their first-half submission.

"But we didn't dig too much into the mindset of that (playing against Damien Hardwick), other than that it's the first game and the spotlight is on.

"I'm more proud of our response, because it could have been a really horrendous result in the end."

Martin will likely return for Thursday's MCG blockbuster against Carlton while Lynch and Nankervis are a chance.

"It's going to make our team better, but Noah (Balta) into the ruck in second half, was terrific and he's going to have to do that anyway," Yze added.

"Sam Naismith toiled hard in his first game for the club, Seth Campbell could have kicked three or four today.

"Dusty going out, disappointing but we had to be smart with that decision and to have him back will be handy."