NOT for Fraser Gehrig the nervous wait to see whether his name would be called in the national draft.

The un-retired St Kilda spearhead did not attend the draft, was not yet even back in the country and had no doubt he would wind up with his beloved Saints — if he wound up anywhere at all, that is.

Having established he was serious through a series of phone calls between Moorabbin and Switzerland, St Kilda took Gehrig at pick 57, fearful that had it waited any longer, another club might pre-empt it.

According to Gehrig, who revealed the story behind his return to the AFL exclusively yesterday in The Age, the Saints needn't have worried.

"I didn't speak to any other club, and if I was a person from another club, I wouldn't have recruited me, either," he told a news conference yesterday.

That wasn't because he couldn't play — 255 games and 540 career goals attest Gehrig can do that. No, it was because he is 31 (32 next March) "and my heart is at St Kilda, not anywhere else".

"I've been at St Kilda seven years and this is the only club I want to play for. If any other club had been silly enough to pick me up, they would have been wasting a pick."

Gehrig has re-signed to a one-year contract.