AFL round 7: Brisbane Lions defeat St Kilda to cement top-four spot

The Saints have now lost three games on the trot — and Ross Lyon is not happy. See what the coach of St Kilda had to say about his animated chat with his players.

St Kilda coach Ross Lyon has conceded he was the most animated he’d been since he returned to the Saints at quarter-time of his side’s 45-point loss to the Brisbane Lions.

Lyon said he was particularly frustrated by his side’s inability to turn first possessions into clearances after St Kilda was restricted to just six inside 50s in the first quarter.

“It’s not personal … how about show some fortitude and hang on to the ball and get it going our way,” Lyon said of the first-break message.

“We had it, but … our ability to control the ball and exit the ball in a manner that’s expected was bottom end.

“You win the ball, first possession off the ruck’s hand and (Brisbane are) too big and strong and strip it or we just flick it out flippantly and the ball gets swept away, that’s what happened a lot.

“After quarter-time they responded to that … not a spray, yeah I was animated.”

Although there was an upturn in performance following the first change, Lyon was left frustrated.

“(It) tells you mentally that they weren’t tuned in to the conditions of their opponent like they need to be, that was really disappointing,” he added of the opening term.

Lyon has shown in the past two weeks that he isn’t afraid to pull the trigger and make an early sub. In last week’s loss to the Western Bulldogs, Liam Henry was taken off at halftime, and on Saturday it was Hugo Garcia who was taken out of the clash midway through the second term.

Ross Lyon was not pleased with his troops early in the game. Picture: Getty Images

Despite being reduced to just three on the interchange later in the match after Mason Wood was concussed, Lyon said he had no regrets regarding the early sub.

“I live in the world of action, right? You’d sit there and go, why’d they pull the sub, I pulled the sub to try and get something done,” Lyon said.

“Sometimes I just get to the roll the eyes stage, sometimes you’ve just got to stop talking about it and go bang.”

The Saints’ efficiency inside 50 was just 39.5 per cent which is well below their season average, and Lyon lamented his side’s ball use.

“We just slaughtered the ball which is just demoralising, and (Brisbane) are that good they go bang bang and people are hanging their heads, which we don’t normally do,” Lyon said.

“Later with the ball, we had some good passages but we’re not executing at a high enough standard for long enough.

“When we won the ball and got some territory I thought we looked dangerous and (Brisbane) had to respond and they did.

“We’ve got a lot of work to do but we know where we’re headed, we’re not deviating.”

SAINTS CRASH BACK TO PACK AS NEALE LEADS LIONS PROCESSION

Brisbane’s dominance over St Kilda continued on Saturday after the Lions cruised to a seventh consecutive victory over the Saints.

The Lions weathered a third quarter Saints surge before flexing their premiership muscle in the final term to run away 45-point victors under the roof at Marvel Stadium.

Brisbane led from start to finish after blowing St Kilda out of the water in the first term, restricting the Saints to just six inside 50s in that time.

The opening stanza of the match was largely uninspiring, with both sides erring on the side of caution and conditions unusually slippery.

A frustrated Ross Lyon wasted no time activating his sub after the lacklustre start, with Hugo Garcia dragged for Zak Jones midway through the second term.

The Lions were wasteful in front of goal for much of the clash – with champion small forward Charlie Cameron kicking 0.4 — but St Kilda failed to capitalise on the plethora of missed chances.

Brisbane coach Chris Fagan lauded the improvement of his side’s team defence

“We were disappointed with the way that we played last week … last week was a continuation of a trend that we needed to do something about, we leaked too much defensively,” Fagan said.

“That was a big focus going into today’s game, pleased to be able to keep them to 73 and only 18 shots.

“The players are probably sick of me banging on about it during the week, but I said to them it’s the same group of players that played for most of the year last year, we were a good team defence last year, what’s going on?

“Sometimes you just need to correct those things and shine the light back on them.”

Lachie Neale was as damaging as ever for Brisbane at both ends of the ground. In attack, he kicked three goals — including a monster set shot from a tight angle — but also had his moments of class in the defensive 50. He finished with 31 disposals.

Eric Hipwood had plenty of nice moments and clunked some good marks in the forward 50 to finish with four goals, while Zac Bailey snagged three.

Nasiah Wanganeen-Milera was a typically bright spark for St Kilda across the match, with his composure, class and silky ball-use on full display yet again.

Lachie Neale goals

The win marked a strong response from Brisbane after the Lions suffered a heavy defeat – their first of the season — at the hands of Collingwood last week.

LOHMANN’S SHORT-LIVED RETURN

Kai Lohmann’s return to the Brisbane side was short-lived after he was on the receiving end of a bruising Liam Stocker bump.

A free kick was paid against Stocker for the incident after the contact sent Lohmann spinning like a helpless rag doll.

Rowan Marshall goal

After spending time in the changerooms, Lohmann returned to the field with a strapped left shoulder and was reported to have both chest and shoulder pain following the bump. He appeared to be in discomfort and his left arm was largely immobile until he was eventually subbed out in the third quarter – although Brisbane recorded the change as ‘tactical’.

Lohmann was playing his first match since round 3 after soreness from an ankle sprain kept him sidelined.

HIGGINS A COLEMAN CONTENDER

Small forward Jack Higgins is mounting an unlikely early season charge for the Coleman Medal.

Higgins was lively for St Kilda on Saturday and booted three goals in the Saints disappointing loss as he continued to create goals from very little

The performance took the 26-year-old’s season to tally to 20 majors, which saw him draw level with Josh Treacy atop the Coleman leaderboard.

MARK OF THE YEAR — ALMOST

Mitch Owens rose supremely to clunk a genuine Mark of the Year contender, but before fans could even process the picture-perfect hanger, it was ruled out, with the umpire deeming the kick had been touched.

It was a spectacular highlight from an otherwise uninspiring opening, even if it counted for little.

Originally published as AFL round 7: Brisbane Lions defeat St Kilda to cement top-four spot