Four burning questions for St Kilda ahead of the AFL restart

I think the intial hit from Covid won't put Saints under pressure, purely because a move to Tassie would require an initial outlay which the AFL just wouldn't have right now. Finnis said St Kilda debt was 8m four years ago and they got severe warnings over getting it reduced. It was increased to 12m at start of this season! Now granted some of that was because they got agreement to get Moorabbin done, but at a time when the club wants to be spending and contending more on the field through recruiting and building a better off-field facility and staff... we also need to tighten the purse strings. The club had 30% less staff than Hawthorn for example, and has been under the cap for 4 years (way under 2yr ago), yet is still spending too much to balance the books. That's not good, because in that same period the club has had record numbers of members sign up! So where's the extra income going to come from? They're not strangled by the Marvel stadium deal any more so that's good, but there's no real way to increase income other than increase membership fees, but those tend to be fairly level across the comp. Saints just don't have the benefactors that other Vic clubs have (neither do North) - as much as the inequalities of the old VFL have been addressed in the draft etc, the income streams is still inequitable. Add on top the covid issue and economic depression - as recession hits over the 5 years to follow, there's lot of factors to consider. We'll have less staff. We'll cut the list - and that probably affects the Saints worse than others because our drafts 2011-2016 were terrible so we actually need some of the current youngsters on the list to develop and kick on; instead some will be delisted without a decent crack this year. Honestly I am really worried about my Saints and where they'll be by 2026 or thereabouts.

So.

I am an English teacher... I can’t help it.

It would be the first time in years.

...but fish can exist in a C.

Yeah the culture of mediocrity and failure has to end. Finals should always be on the agenda. The players cannot have a bad attitude and think they aren't up to it and that failure is acceptable. It's a results driven business and they need to perform. I think all the supporters are sick of it and things need to change. Nearly 10 years without a finals appearance is not good enough at all. A lot of other clubs think the saints are a joke and this perception must be kicked to the curb.

Not sure what is happening with Austin. Saints have not been very good at recruiting or developing players over the past 10 years. Hopefully things will be different under a new coach and hopefully the recruits from last year prove to be good. Jones had 3 or 4 shots on goal in R1 and missed all of them from memory. He should know that goal kicking isn’t his strength and should find options instead. He wasn’t too impressive in that respect. Was very costly in that tight loss to North. They really need a breakout year from one of their younger players like Clark or King to move up the ladder. Was surprised Josh Battle didn’t play in R1 against North after having a great year in 19′. He was badly missed and hopefully he will play in R2.

I think you're being a bit harsh on Ratts. We should give him the benefit of the doubt and time to prove himself. I don't think he is a Richardson 2.0. I thought the Saints played much more slick in r1 than I had ever seen under Richo at least in the first half and despite the fadeout. It was certainly a bad loss after giving up such a commanding lead but we still had plenty of chances to get the lead back in the 4th quarter. That set shot miss by Marshall was a shocker and I was surprised he missed. He is normally reliable when he has set shots like that. That would have given us back the lead with less than a minute to go from memory. It should have never gotten to that point in the first place but our goal kicking has let us down too many times. He said that would be a focus in the off season last year but it certainly didn't seem to improve on match day. Not sure what the players are doing wrong or what they do at training. Very frustrating to lose games we are meant to win. I agree with pretty much everything else you said, although I think Butler will be better than a servicable small forward and he did kick over 30 goals for Richmond in a premiership year for them. Bruce was a big loss and we will need to go after another CHF. King will be a great player for us and he looked good in R1 against Tarrant. I don't think we got the wrong King and I wouldn't be surprised if we can snare his brother in a few years. Still not sold on him buying into the GC cultural rebuild despite the extension. That was all for optics and I think he would have been given a good deal to stay for a 2nd year player. It was good we got rid of Steven in hindsight but you are right that we should have traded him 18' and got a better deal. I think Geelong may have known what they were getting into by recruiting him and the saints knew realistically we couldn't demand too much for him given his personal problems. Time will tell how we go this year and hopefully this year isn't another disappointment like we are used to unfortunately.

Tbf, Sturt did look the goods and he was impressive. Freo seem to have found something with him. Has a lot of upside. I thought it was just a disappointing loss and Freo probably should have won. They had all the momentum. If Freo only had another minute or two in the final quarter they might have been able to get another goal and win. That’s why I don’t like the shorter quarters at all. I think Freo will do fine under Longmuir and I think Freo have a pretty good list overall for what it’s worth.

Because we like to see which self righteous smug load will be first to correct us for fun ;) today's lucky winner is you big 4 sticks and your prize is a feeling of superiority :thumbup:

Why are neo-liberals always bad spellers? There is no c in exist.

Can’t agree with your assessment that a bottom four result should be aimed for. Given the aggressive recruiting to full fill seemingly holes in the teams make up, I would expect they should demand as a minimum a central ladder position

Not that impressed with our trading over the last period. Nor with our choice of coach. Losing Steven was understandable – but they should have let him go the previous year when he had currency. Now we’re paying him to play elsewhere and received steak knives for him. Bruce is a big loss, and has upset our structure. We have no readily available chf. Acres was a disappointment. A lot of potential but we only saw occassional glimpses. And the ins? Howard could be very good, but we thought the same about Logan. Ryder a total waste. A backup ruck who cannot play a competitive forward role, and with shortened games now unlikely we will see him at all. Bruce was a far better option as a forward/backup ruck. Jones is just a B grade mid. Butler as well, and we have plenty of B grade small forwards already. The marquee trade in Hill was a positive at least, but we had a better mid two years ago in Steven, and it showed one A grader doesn’t make a team competitive. Hopefully King will live up to the hype, but needs time, I’m also wondering if we chose the wrong brother. Ratten? Players like him, they liked Richo as well. They’re young and don’t have the experience of playing under a good coach. From all i have heard from him, it’s simply carrying on from Richo, and the final games last year and then the game against North indeed showed exactly that. We needed someone fresh. He’s obviously expected to see instant results, hence trading for the here and now. Time will tell, but i’m not confident.

And the irony of being in a free-settler state. Of which WA was first.

Stripes aren’t a Mascot Pete. A Magpie would be a mascot

I just don’t care enough to argue really. I understand Ed protecting the brand of the club but I’m more interested in the footy starting. Let Port wear the stripes if you want, I don’t really care.

Agreed, Freo will be better than most think this year.

What Mascot is getting shared?

I'm really surprised the saints haven't used Logan Austin more, he looked the goods at Port but hasn't quite made the grade at St Kilda

If you think Sam Sturt's skills were shocking, or Bewley's, or Fyfe's, or Sunny's or Tucker's...you weren't watching Talking in eastern states cliches, Verc.