Saints sweat on Montagna hamstring injury
Jul 22, 2017 - 6:53 PM St Kilda coach Alan Richardson is hopeful a hamstring injury won't stop Leigh Montagna playing again but warns his side won't make the AFL finals unless they show more aggression against the top teams.Richardson said his team didn't cope with the pressure imposed by Sydney in their 42-point loss to the surging Swans at the SCG on Saturday.
The Saints won 21 more hitouts, but lost the clearances and contested possessions and had 28 fewer inside-50s than Sydney.
Out of the top eight, the Saints face a daunting group of season-shaping games over the next three weeks against fellow finals aspirants Port Adelaide, West Coast and Melbourne.
"We won't make the final eight, unless we play really strong aggressive footy, particularly against these sort of teams, the good footy teams," Richardson said.
Richardson could be without his two most senior players - Montagna and Nick Riewoldt - for Saturday's clash with Port in Adelaide.
Montagna limped off in the third quarter, with Richardson unsure of the severity of the hamstring injury.
Question marks remain over whether the 33-year-old 287-game veteran will play on beyond this season.
Asked if he was hopeful Montagna would be seen again after his injury setback Richardson replied: "We are.
"They (hamstring injuries) are always a tricky one, you just have to wait and get all the evidence and do the scans.
"He's been in in pretty good shape for us, so we'll just have to wait."
The 34-year-old Riewoldt, who chalked up his 333rd game on Saturday, could possibly be rested.
"It was planned that Rooey (Riewoldt) would either miss this one (against Sydney) or next (week) given that we've had a couple of six-day (turnarounds) in a row, a trip to Perth, now a trip to here," Richardson said.
"But we had eight days between our last performance and this one and he'd been able to train pretty well, so there's a chance that he'll miss (next week).
"But we'll just have to wait and see how he pulls up and what our conditioning and our medical people think."
One positive for Richardson out of Saturday's game was the strong efforts of two recalled players, midfielder Luke Dunstan and ruckman Billy Longer.
Source: AAP
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