From the Pocket: St Kilda are a grim watch with Ross Lyon’s limitations exposed

No matter what you expected of St Kilda this year, surely you expected better than that. Sunday was the quintessential Ross Lyon game – minus the win, and minus the effort. The coach tried to remain upbeat in the post-match press conference. As always, he sought to deflect, to charm and to set the narrative around the team. But he was fooling no one, perhaps with the exception of his former media colleagues who continue to pull their punches. For it was blindingly obvious on Sunday – St Kilda don’t have the stars, they certainly don’t have the midfield and they don’t really have anything that makes you want to watch them, or believe in them.

Lyon has been granted an unusual amount of power at St Kilda. He’s shaped a lot of change around him – recruiters, development staff, CEOs. When he was appointed, he laid out his vision for how he wanted the team to play, and how he wanted the club to be run. He was disarming, and he was blunt. He gave us all the old aphorisms. Football has changed, he said, and he would change with it. He’d be less of a lunatic in the box. He’d be less of an autocrat. He’d be “Cuddly Ross”.

What he doesn’t have, and what he hasn’t been able to change, is the list. He said he barely looked at the list before taking on the job at Fremantle and St Kilda. But in his previous role, he had Matthew Pavlich and he had a young Nathan Fyfe. This time around, he inherited a list that looked plain, clogged and poorly constructed.

Early on in his tenure, the Saints caught the competition on the hop. They were limited, but they were super fit and they were relentless. But it’s since stalled. The Saints are a grim watch right now. The coach seems a bit bewildered by it all. He thought they’d be better than this. “Failure’s feedback,” is one of his favourites. He keeps saying it, and they keep losing the same way.

The supporter base has seen it all, heard it all and been subjected to too much. But they expected better than this. Losing is hard enough. Losing and scratching around for a couple of goals a quarter is just depressing.

“A year of exploration,” Lyon called his first year. 2024 has been more of a reality check. For him, it’s the realisation that a coach can’t just waltz in and overcome decades of poor drafting, poor trading and poor development. For everyone else, it’s Lyon’s own limitations that are glaring – the inability, or unwillingness, to foster a brand of football that is sustainable and, at the very least, watchable.

• This is an extract from Guardian Australia’s free weekly AFL email, From the Pocket. To get the full version, just visit this page and follow the instructions