St Kilda set to review FNQ deal

ST KILDA will review its twoyear agreement to play in Cairns at the end of the season despite believing the deal, worth between $600,000$700,000 a game, has strong player buy-in.

The Saints kicked 4.18 in humid and slippery conditions and at one stage piled on 10 consecutive points as Robbie Gray’s late behind dropped them to 5-2 with Melbourne ahead on Sunday.

St Kilda was able to cut $4.2 million of debt and reduce that figure to $9.56 million last year and it is understood it plans to shrink it by a further $2 million this year.

The St Kilda players who enjoyed time in a Noosa hub in 2020 were happy to play in Cairns with nearly every midsized Melbourne club selling games away. The club has also been able to boost its football department funding because of the deal, using all the allowable exemptions to pay over the $6.5 million cap.

The Western Bulldogs play in Ballarat, Melbourne in Northern Territory and North Melbourne and Hawthorn in Tasmania. But the Saints will review that deal despite its lucrative nature, with St Kilda’s slick game and marking forwards not conducive to the slippery conditions of Cairns.

Richmond players protested against the club’s three-year deal to play in Cairns from 2011-13 and the Tigers dropped the final season of that deal.

Richmond star Jack Riewoldt told Fox Footy on Sunday the Tigers had been shattered after losing after the siren to Gold Coast’s Karmichael Hunt in their second Cairns game.

“I have got no doubt the Saints boys would have got on the plane last night, and their leaders would have said, ‘Why are we playing up here?” he said. “We could have played at Marvel Stadium at a ground that is suited to their home ground and to watch five minutes of that football last night it was slippery and it wasn’t the way the Saints wanted to play.

“I have go no doubt they Saints got on the plane and had the same conversations we were having after the Karmichael Hunt game,”