Lyon Relieved With Week’s Break

06 September 2009

ST KILDA coach Ross Lyon says the club will have to carefully map out a plan for the next two weeks, now that it has earned a break before taking on either the Brisbane Lions or Western Bulldogs in the first preliminary final.

Speaking after St Kilda's 28-point win over Collingwood at the MCG on Sunday, Lyon said his team will need to switch off and on again in time for a sudden-death match-up in two weeks time.

"This is the game that we wanted to be in. That's what footy clubs exist for – for these sorts of games," he said.

"It's two hours of footy that's furthered us in the competition, which is the aim, so we get to prepare for a preliminary final week, which has its own challenges.

"We get the week off … we'll have to sit down and plan and prepare really well with our conditioners, but we're really confident with [Dave] Misson and Peter Mulkearns, who worked with Denis [Pagan] for a long time at North [Melbourne] and has been to a number of prelims and Misson with Sydney."

Lyon said he didn't believe the Saints were locked into week three until the final siren.

"I thought it was a battle all day and at no stage did I think we were safe," he said.

The third-year St Kilda coach was also pleased to avoid a six-day turnaround against Adelaide, which will enter next Saturday's clash against Collingwood with an eight-day break.

"Any team is really capable of a one-off six-day break, but I think it's a little unfair that you can finish top-four and come off a losing first final and play a team that's fifth or eighth and gets an eight day to six [break]," Lyon said.

"But teams can cope and we wouldn't have been thrilled if that had been the situation."

After back-to-back losses in rounds 20-21, and a slow start against wooden-spooner Melbourne last Sunday, Lyon said there were signs that the wheels were again turning.

"I spoke to a coach of another club and he said: 'Gee, I watched that game [against Melbourne] and I thought you were pretty good in a lot of areas and I thought you were being marked quite harshly'. I thought: 'That's nice'," he said.

"As much as we weren't fantastic, we certainly didn't play poorly."

He also drew inspiration from Geelong's win over the Western Bulldogs on Saturday at the MCG, after the Cats had also gone through a tough period in recent times.

"We trained with purpose. They were really sharp in absorbing the opposition information when they were asked questions. They were able to respond really quickly and there were a number of them answering. The energy and focus was really there."

Although Lyon acknowledged the external hype about St Kilda would continue to grow, he was adamant that the Saints would keep their focus sharp internally.

"I can't control that. We're pretty focused on what we need to do … we just won round 23 and we get to advance to the next round. We're a pretty level, mature group that's been to three prelims," he said.

Source: www.saints.com.au

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Lyon Relieved With Week’s Break

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