St. Kilda medium to long term viability

[Saintmike65]

Like most on this forum, I've been following St. Kilda for a very long time, 55 years to be exact.
Unfortunately, apart from a few successful years, the club has been bogged down in mediocrity for most of its existence.
The most successful era, that of the Alan Jeans era, was brought about because of good people running the club, a good coach plus a good recruiter in Ian Drake.
The stability was there, as hopefully, it is now, with a good coach in Brett Ratten, shrewd off-field personnel, a good list management team plus a shrewd president.
My main concern is keeping the gang together, if we can do this, a sustained finals period should be the result.
Our debt is a concern, obviously, however, success breeds success, just look at Richmond, they were a basket case just 5 years ago.
The Grant Thomas/ Ross Lyon eras were good but we didn't quite have all the planets aligned like we seem to now...let's enjoy the ride!

[The Billings Method]

Like most on this forum, I've been following St. Kilda for a very long time, 55 years to be exact.
Unfortunately, apart from a few successful years, the club has been bogged down in mediocrity for most of its existence.
The most successful era, that of the Alan Jeans era, was brought about because of good people running the club, a good coach plus a good recruiter in Ian Drake.
The stability was there, as hopefully, it is now, with a good coach in Brett Ratten, shrewd off-field personnel, a good list management team plus a shrewd president.
My main concern is keeping the gang together, if we can do this, a sustained finals period should be the result.
Our debt is a concern, obviously, however, success breeds success, just look at Richmond, they were a basket case just 5 years ago.
The Grant Thomas/ Ross Lyon eras were good but we didn't quite have all the planets aligned like we seem to now...let's enjoy the ride!

Spot on, Saintmike65. Yabbie famously said, "Clubs with s*** administrations don't win flags, laddie!" Our best recruit in recent times is Simon Lethlean. If ever there was evidence that strong and competent administration and management is crucial to success, he is it.

Cleaned out the deadwood, appointed Gallagher, Rath, DOS, Roughy and got Gubby in to help with trading and helped transition us from Richo to Ratts. Improvement has been rapid.

Now we have all those people in place, the real test is hanging onto them as a team. It's the same as managing your playing list. Beware of the poachers.

We were a hair's breadth away from losing Lethlean to Essendon as their CEO. If that had happened, I would've done a Terry Wallett and "fair dinkum spewed up!" Luckily the druggies buggered that up and are stuck with XC. Carlton rejected him and Melbourne appointed Pert ahead
of him.

He is a CEO in waiting and would've had the top job somewhere if not for his "extracurricular activities" at the Death Star. There are many in the industry who believe he should have Gil's job. I concurr.

For once, someone's misfortune has resulted in a lucky break for us. We can't afford to carelessly misplace him, the way we did with Lyon. Maybe Matt Finnis could arrange for a smooth transition so he can stay. If he doesn't get our top job sooner rather than later, it's only a matter if time before he gets a godfather type offer from elsewhere.

I feel confident, that for the first time in my 42 years of following the saints, we have an off field team that is capable of taking us all the way. The list isn't looking too bad either.

[Sanctorum]

I agree with all of the foregoing and feel quietly confident that, given a relatively injury-free list, especially the older guns like Ryder, Hill, Hannebery and Carlisle, the 2021 St Kilda team will be a strong chance to go al the way!