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Lyon Backs Youth to Bridge Gap

20 Sep 2008

ST KILDA coach Ross Lyon says he has full faith in his younger players to build on a year that took them to a preliminary final.

After losing to Hawthorn by 54 points on Saturday night, Lyon said he would look closely at the list in preparation for next season.

"It’s not a time for flippancy from me as senior coach now," he said. "We’ve got good people who will sit down and analyse and make decisions.

"We’ll add talent, we’ll improve our systems and we will demand hard work and they are a couple of key ingredients to be successful."

Lyon said there were plenty of lessons to be learnt from the performance against the Hawks, which saw the Saints start well but fall 47 points behind by half time.

"It won’t be swept under the carpet," he said.

"We’ve got to bridge the gap between the top three. We thought we’d be closer than we were tonight.

"I think you’ll get a great grand final (next week). They (Geelong and Hawthorn) are clearly the two best teams and they have two unique systems that are in some ways similar.

"It will be won and lost in the midfield as it was tonight."

While admitting it seemed unlikely at stages of the season that the Saints would make it to September, let alone the penultimate week, Lyon said no-one would be patting themselves on the back for the final ladder position.

"I take no satisfaction in it (making the preliminary final). If you’ve been involved in any role at a club it’s not about making preliminary finals.

"In the wash-up we’ve improved and we know where we’re heading. Everyone’s trying to head to the same spot. It was a turnaround, no doubt about it."

Robert Harvey and Fraser Gehrig have retired, but the future of defender Max Hudghton is unclear.

Lyon said he hoped Hudghton, who had been playing with a broken toe for three weeks, would stay on after shutting Hawthorn spearhead Lance Franklin out of the game.

"Max played a special game tonight. He kept Lance Franklin to one goal," he said.

"He is a great defender and there is a strong indication Max will play on but he wants some time to think about that."

Whatever his decision, Lyon added there were plenty of developing players at Moorabbin to replace outgoing veterans.

"We felt we’ve unearthed some young talent. If you analyse every list closely there’s additions from drafting and trading," he said.

"There were a couple we thought about playing like Jack Steven and we gave Benny McEvoy a game. It's a relentless competition and we need to go away in the old light of day and assess our list.

"Those that can take the club to a premiership and be successful, whenever that is [will stay]."

St Kilda's Raphael Clarke gets a kick away despite some Hawthorn pressure on Saturday night

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