The season began well with the club winning the preseason competition, the 2008 NAB Cup.
The club had wins over Richmond in the round of 16, Geelong in the quarter-finals, Essendon in the semi-finals and won the final against the Adelaide Crows by five points at Football Park (AAMI stadium) 2-7-9-(69) to 0-9-10-(64) - St Kilda's third preseason cup win in the AFL. Jason Gram won the Michael Tuck medal for the player judged best on ground during the final.
Regular season
St Kilda defeated Essendon (Round 22) 31/8/08 - (Click to expand)
Despite the promising start, the Saints went on to have a mixed first half of the season with a five-win, six-loss record. After this their fortunes vastly improved and they gained a place in the finals series.
This mixed season drew both criticism and praise at differing times towards Lyon from supporters and the media. His game plan has been described as one championing accountability, similar to the Sydney Swans model by Paul Roos.[1] Lyon's surprise move to drop midfielder Nick Dal Santo (as well as Stephen Milne) from the side was due to them not meeting these "benchmarks".[2] Arguably, it was a turning point in the Saints' season, as they went on to win the next four games following this bold move.
In a very competitive 2008 premiership season St Kilda Football Club qualified for the 2008 premiership season finals series, finishing the home and away rounds in the top four, in fourth position, with 13 wins.
Finals series
In the 2008 finals series, St Kilda played Geelong in the qualifying finals. St Kilda 8.13 (61) lost to Geelong 17.17 (119) in front of 71,653 at the MCG. In the semi finals St Kilda 17.4 (106) defeated Collingwood 9.18 (72) in front 76,707. In the preliminary finals St Kilda 9.10 (64) lost to Hawthorn 18.10 (118) by 54 points in front of 77,002 at the MCG, being eliminated from the finals. St Kilda was eliminated by Hawthorn in the preliminary final. This was the third preliminary final lost to an eventual premier (after Sydney in 2005 and Port Adelaide in 2004) in five years.
The St Kilda Football Club, nicknamed the Saints, is a professional Australian rules football club based in Melbourne, Victoria. The club plays in the Australian Football League (AFL), the sport's premier league.
Robert Jeffrey Harvey is an Australian rules football coach and former player. He is currently an assistant coach for the St Kilda Football Club in the Australian Football League (AFL). As a player, he played his entire career with St Kilda in the AFL. Following retirement, Harvey embarked on a career in assistant coaching which has spanned across three decades, highlighted by a nine-game stint as caretaker head coach of the Collingwood Football Club in 2021.
The 2004 AFL season was the 108th season of the Australian Football League (AFL), the highest level senior Australian rules football competition in Australia, which was known as the Victorian Football League until 1989. The season featured sixteen clubs, ran from 26 March until 25 September, and comprised a 22-game home-and-away season followed by a finals series featuring the top eight clubs.
Lenny Hayes is a former professional Australian rules footballer who played for the St Kilda Football Club in the Australian Football League (AFL) from 1999 to 2014. He is currently an assistant coach at the St Kilda Football Club.
Nick Dal Santo is the senior coach of the St Kilda Football Club in the AFL Women's competition and a retired Australian rules footballer who played for St Kilda and North Melbourne in the Australian Football League (AFL).
Rivalries in the Australian Football League exist between many teams, most of which typically draw large crowds and interest regardless of both teams' positions on the ladder. The AFL encourages the building of such rivalries, as a method of increasing publicity for the league, to the point of designating one round each year as "Rivalry Round" when many of these match-ups are held on the one weekend. Whilst some rivalries, such as between teams from adjacent areas, are still strong, the designation of an entire round of fixtures as a Rivalry Round is often criticised due to some arbitrary match-ups, or ignoring stronger and more recent rivalries.
Ross Lyon is a former Australian rules football player and the current senior coach of the St Kilda Football Club in the Australian Football League (AFL). He previously coached St Kilda from 2007 to 2011 and the Fremantle Football Club from 2012 to 2019. He played for Fitzroy and the Brisbane Bears from 1985 to 1995.
The 1995 AFL season was the 99th season of the Australian Football League (AFL), the highest level senior Australian rules football competition in Australia, which was known as the Victorian Football League until 1989.
The 1986 VFL season was the 90th season of the Victorian Football League (VFL), the highest level senior Australian rules football competition in Victoria. The season featured twelve clubs, ran from 29 March until 27 September, and comprised a 22-game home-and-away season followed by a finals series featuring the top five clubs.
The 1997 AFL Grand Final was an Australian rules football game contested between the Adelaide Football Club and the St Kilda Football Club, held at the Melbourne Cricket Ground in Melbourne on 27 September 1997. It was the 101st annual grand final of the Australian Football League, staged to determine the premiers for the 1997 AFL season. The match, attended by 99,645 spectators, was won by Adelaide by a margin of 31 points, marking that club's first premiership victory.
The Collingwood Football Club is an Australian rules football club playing in the Australian Football League.
The Australian Football League's 2008 Finals Series determined the top eight final positions of the 2008 AFL season. It began on the weekend of 5 September 2008 and ended with the 112th AFL Grand Final at the Melbourne Cricket Ground on 27 September 2008. The Hawthorn Football Club were crowned the 2008 AFL Premiers, beating the Geelong Football Club by 26 points in front of a crowd of 100,012.
The 2009 AFL Grand Final was an Australian rules football game contested between the St Kilda Football Club and the Geelong Football Club at the Melbourne Cricket Ground on 26 September 2009. It was the 113th annual grand final of the Australian Football League, staged to determine the premiers for the 2009 AFL season.
The 2008 AFL season was the Adelaide Football Club's 18th season in the Australian Football League (AFL).
The St Kilda Football Club, nicknamed the Saints, is a professional Australian rules football club based in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. The club plays in the Australian Football League (AFL), the highest league in the country.
St Kilda Football Club competed in the 2009 Australian Football League (AFL) premiership season. They won a club record 19 consecutive matches between Round 1 and Round 19 of the season and qualified for the 2009 finals series in first position as the minor premiers – the club's third minor premiership. The club won through to the 2009 AFL Grand Final after qualifying and preliminary finals wins, but they were defeated by Geelong by 12 points.
The St Kilda Football Club competed in the 2010 Australian Football League (AFL) premiership season. They finished the home and away season in third place. They won through to the 2010 Grand Final after qualifying and preliminary finals wins and drew with Collingwood in the grand final, however they were beaten in the replay to finish runner up for the second consecutive year.
The 2014 Australian Football League finals series is the 118th annual edition of the VFL/AFL final series, the Australian rules football tournament staged to determine the winner of the 2014 AFL Premiership Season. The series ran over four weekends in September 2014, and culminated with the 2014 AFL Grand Final at the Melbourne Cricket Ground on 27 September 2014.
The 2016 Australian Football League finals series was the 120th annual edition of the VFL/AFL final series, the Australian rules football tournament staged to determine the winner of the 2016 AFL Premiership Season. The series ran over four weekends in September and October 2016, culminating with the 2016 AFL Grand Final, between the Sydney Swans and the Western Bulldogs at the Melbourne Cricket Ground on 1 October 2016. The Western Bulldogs defeated the Sydney Swans by 22 points to end the Western Bulldogs 62-year premiership drought, becoming the first team in AFL history to win the premiership from seventh place.
The history of the Adelaide Football Club dates back to their founding in 1990, when the Australian Football League (AFL) approved a license application by the South Australian National Football League (SANFL) to base a new club out of Adelaide, South Australia in the expanding AFL competition. The club also operates a side in the AFL Women's competition, which held its first season in 2017.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.
