Leave Richo out of it, says Saint

ST KILDA has one eye fixed on the AFL’s top eight and the “noise” around the tenure of coach Allan Richardson was unjustified, says Saints defender Shane Savage.

The Saints gave Richmond a fright last weekend and Savage believes his club can follow in the footsteps of a rejuvenated North Melbourne, the Saints’ Round 16 opponent in Hobart on Sunday and Savage’s 150th game.

By winning three of their past four and downing second-placed Collingwood on Saturday, the Kangas have turned their season around and the Saints can too.

“They’ve been outstanding for the past month, since Brad Scott left, and Rhyce Shaw has done a fantastic job rallying the troops,” Savage said.

“They’re playing a really tough brand of football and they definitely showed us that against the Pies.

“They’ve found their mojo and I feel like we’re not too far away from that as well.”

He said the focus on the future of Richardson as Saints coach was unwarranted.

“We don’t listen to the noise outside the club,” Savage said. “Richo is doing a good job and he’s faced a lot of adversity this year.

“We’ve had a lot of injuries to key players and we are still in a position to potentially make finals. I think it’s been blown up a bit too much, but that is the landscape of our game.”

The loss to Richmond gave the Saints confidence they could compete with the best sides instead of being another injection of regret.

“It was disappointing we couldn’t put in a four-quarter effort, but it was a better response to the previous week against the Brisbane Lions,” Savage said.

“The effort was there, there was fight in the boys, but some things didn’t go our way in the last quarter and we’ll look to respond and put in a four-quarter effort this week.”