Brett Ratten’s fate as Saints coach sealed when his pleas to keep job were unsuccessful

St Kilda gave Brett Ratten seven hours to beg for his job. In the end, the board sealed his fate. Here’s the inside story of how and why the Saints “blindsided” Ratts.

St Kilda, on Friday, sacked coach Brett Ratten.

Dressed in his St Kilda attire, Brett Ratten headed to Margaret Court Arena on Sunday to cast an eye over the physical testing of draft prospects at the AFL combine.

On Friday Ratten had interviewed teenagers on the Saints’ talent board, having helped shape a list strategy that will focus on investing heavily in the national draft.

Little did Ratten know that he would spend the next four days interviewing for his own job.

New chief executive Simon Lethlean told Ratten on Sunday night that he was in the gun, just 93 days after his two-year contract extension was announced.

READ HOW THE SACKING OF BRETT RATTEN WENT DOWN HERE.

“Brett was pretty blindsided,” president Andrew Bassat said on Friday.

“We didn’t know where (the external review) would go. I don’t think Brett had any inkling that he was specifically in (our) sights.

“In sympathy to him, the fact that we signed him up to a contract not too long before probably made that harder for him to see coming.”

St Kilda, on Friday, sacked coach Brett Ratten.

That extension was announced on July 8, the same month the Saints started the review that ultimately saw Ratten sacked before his new contract had even started.

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Ratten, 51, was given seven hours to change St Kilda’s mind in meetings this week.

He pleaded his case at Bassat’s house in the backdrop to the AFL’s trade period.

Bassat and Lethlean wanted to give Ratten a “genuine opportunity” to convince them that the external review’s recommendation that he should be sacked was a mistake.

“Brett, Simon and I had a meeting on Monday and over the course of the week I spent about seven hours with Brett going over all the details and giving him every opportunity he could, with a genuine open mind, to tell us that we got something wrong in terms of the decision,” Bassat said.

“Nothing was able to convince the board and the working committee that this was the wrong decision.”

Ratten made his final pitch to keep his job at the club’s Moorabbin headquarters on Thursday.

He returned to RSEA Park later that day to learn his fate, which was decided in St Kilda’s board room.

“Brett remained at the club last night (Thursday) until the board meeting finished and we spoke to him face-to-face,” Lethlean said.

“Brett is the sort of person that would put the club (first) and make sure he is available for all that. It’s exactly what he did.

“It’s a significant decision. We weren’t going to do it over the phone to him, and he knew that the decision was going to be discussed and debated heavily.”

Bassat said Ratten “put his case forward very well” and the board “agonised over the decision” until 6pm.

“We’ve been pretty transparent with Brett, as hard as it’s been,” Bassat said.

“We owed Brett a lot, but we certainly owed him honesty so we’ve given him complete honesty through the course of the week that we thought the decision was likely to go against him.

“But we wanted to give him every chance to convince us we were wrong. He’s handled that better than anyone I can imagine.”

The Saints won’t have to pay Ratten’s contract out in full and will spend every cent in next year’s $6.95 million soft cap.

“There are appropriate protections in contracts these days for all football staff that protects the club and also is fair to the staff member,” Lethlean said.

Bassat indicated Ratten could’ve landed free agent Jordan De Goey and coached finals this year and still lost his job.

That’s because when Bassat commissioned the external review there were two questions he wanted answered.

In his words, they were:

1) Are we genuinely on the path to contending, or are we kidding ourselves? And:

2) Are we at serious risk of getting stuck in the sixth-10th zone?

“The answers I got were troubling,” Bassat said.

“To be entirely clear, the nature of the head coaching role has a lot of focus on it … but we need to get better in our program for us to be successful.

“This isn’t all about a coaching program, and (isn’t) all about Brett. If we don’t fix those things, the new coach will also struggle to be successful.

“So we’re really mindful of that, and we’re going to fix all areas of the organisation. But we really felt that to maximise the chance of success we need a different style of leadership.”

Lenny Hayes coaches the Saints’ midfield. Picture: Sarah Reed

Club legend Lenny Hayes will return as midfield coach and Ratten’s successor will help appoint a new forwards coach to replace Brendon Lade, who has joined Western Bulldogs.

Veteran administrator Geoff Walsh will start on November 1 as the new football boss, which list manager James Gallagher and head of football David Rath have accepted.

The Saints won’t take long to employ their eighth coach this century, a period in which Geelong has had just two coaches.

The new man — or old man, if Ross Lyon is chosen — will be installed before players return for pre-season on November 22.

“As we said, we’ll be swift and decisive. That means weeks, not months,” Lethlean said.

Ratten hadn’t lost the players, who were “saddened” by the decision when they were officially told on Friday morning.

“But they understand that they need to dig a bit deeper now,” Lethlean said.

“They need to turn their minds to how they can get better, and we’re going to provide a football program that asks more of them.”

Bassat said the forensic review put the “processes that are underpinning the results” in sharp focus.

“The size of the gap … between where we are and where some of the better clubs are (is) pretty big,” Bassat said.

“And we felt we needed a new style of leadership and a new voice to close that gap.”

The Saints were the last team to beat premiers Geelong. But there were too many downs on the Ratten rollercoaster.

Simon Lethlean at St Kilda’s announcement of Brett Ratten’s departure. Picture: Getty Images

“We’ve beaten some of the top sides (but) we lack consistency, we lack our best players playing at their top end all the time,” Lethlean said.

“We’ve just won 11 games this season, we are not bottom of the table. We acknowledged last year that we can’t just keep going to trade, we need to invest in our youth.

“You would have seen (Mitch) Owens, (Marcus) Windhager, (Nasiah) Wanganeen-Milera play this year and show the benefits of going to the draft.

“We’ve certainly got to our list to a really competitive spot.”

The Saints had 11 players aged 27-29 on their 2022 list, which was more than every other club.

Bassat conceded Ratten wasn’t given the best opportunity to enjoy success.

“We can’t look back and say that Brett was absolutely set up for success. I can’t say that with honesty,” he said.

“That makes this decision even harsher. But we still felt, taking that into account, that even with a better setup around him we felt there were coaches potentially with different characteristics that gave us a far greater chance of being successful.

“That’s a harsh decision to make. We won’t pretend that Brett was given every opportunity to be the best coach could be.

“But the alternative was to go ahead with our strong doubts for next year and lose the season. We felt that risk was too great, as harsh as that decision is.

“Just out of empathy to Brett I need to add it’s a really, really tough blow for him.

“He handled himself as well as anyone possibly could. But he’s disappointed and feels we made the wrong decision, we won’t deny that.”

Sacked former North Melbourne coach David Noble was among those who led St Kilda’s review. Picture: Alex Coppel

Lethlean said the decision was designed to “get this club out of the middle of the road and get us to the top of the table”.

The review “dug into every corner of the club and the football program” and was led by Bassat and a working committee including ex-North Melbourne coach David Noble, board members Jason Blake, Russell Caplan and Dean Anderson and Lethlean.

“We find ourselves mid-table and to pursue where we need to get to to win a flag, which this club desires and its fans deserve, means taking the next step in what we need by way of the attitude, the performance, the non-negotiables, the strong leadership we need and the buy in from the playing group,” Lethlean said.

“And all of that requires us to head in a new direction, and that’s really hard on people.

“But a combination of lots of different feedback, and performance and things we’ve known about where we need to get to brought us to a really tough decision.”

As for what’s next for Ratten?

“I hope he’s off fishing right now with people he loves and trusts,” Lethlean said.

“That’s where he deserves to be, with those he trusts going forward.”