Australian Football

Match Report

St Kilda kept their finals hope alive with a surprising 71-point thumping of Essendon. Both sides were coming off contrasting results the previous week: the Saints were disappointing in their loss to North Melbourne, while Essendon were irrepressible in destroying the Western Bulldogs. This was a result nobody saw coming. Essendon had been St Kilda’s bogey side in the last few years, with the Saints’ last win against the Bombers coming at the beginning of 2009. Star small forward Stephen Milne booted five goals for the Saints in his 250th game. Four of his goals came during an incredible third term where the Saints put the result beyond doubt. The pain of losing a winnable game was further compounded for Essendon when Michael Hurley went down with a hamstring injury. He was expected to miss up to three weeks. The loss made it extremely difficult for the Bombers to push for a top-four spot with a testing run home to the finals. St Kilda big man Justin Koschitzke was reported for rough conduct on Courtney Dempsey.

GOALS

St Kilda: Milne 5; Riewoldt 4; Koschitzke, Siposs, Wilkes, Saad, Schneider 2; Gilbert, Gram

Essendon: Hille, Melksham 2; Carlisle, Hurley, Reimers, Davey

BEST - 

AFL.COM.AU
St Kilda: Milne, Dal Santo, Hayes, Riewoldt, Siposs, McEvoy, Simpkin
Essendon: Dempsey, Heppell, Watson, Melksham, Lonergan

BEST - THE AGE
St Kilda: Milne, Riewoldt, Hayes, Dal Santo, Armitage, Siposs
Essendon: Dempsey, Heppell, Watson, Howlett, Hille, Lonergan


COACHES COMMENTS
Scott Watters (StK): Defensively we were pretty strong and offensively we've probably been pretty consistent for most of the year, so it was a well-rounded performance.

James Hird (Ess): We were disappointing, weren't we? We didn't play well, we got beaten in just about every area of the game by St Kilda. They turned up to play with a game plan and they stopped us doing what we wanted to do.

Umpires: Stevic, Meredith, Mitchell