PAUL Roos, once chastised by AFL boss Andrew Demetriou for his coaching tactics, yesterday defended his former assistant Ross Lyon in the wake of Saturday night's lambasted St Kilda-Hawthorn game.

That Lyon's Saints had won four matches while managing what the Sydney coach described as the worst injury list in the competition was "phenomenal", Roos said.

"The only thing I'd say about St Kilda is, you're really playing against the (VFL) Casey Scorpions and I can't believe that Ross would be criticised.

"St Kilda's (injury list is worst) by far, it's miles worse. Nine of your best 18 are out of the St Kilda footy club. I doubt that Adelaide has got nine of their best 18 out. To have nine of your best 18 out of your team is very, very restrictive … I defy any team in the competition to be able to regularly combat those injuries," Roos said.

"Melbourne are zero (wins) eight (losses). St Kilda's four and four, and I think what Rossy's been able to do with the amount of injuries they've got at the moment is quite phenomenal."

The Saints, who already have had to cover for Lenny Hayes, Brendon Goddard, Max Hudghton, Matt Maguire, Jason Gram, Andrew Thompson, Aaron Hamill, Xavier, Raphael and Matthew Clarke are likely to have 24 fit players available this week. It means all will take the flight to Perth today ahead of Friday night's match against Fremantle.

The club's injury troubles worsened last weekend when Leigh Montagna broke his jaw. He played out the game but will be sidelined until round 12.

Nick Riewoldt and Nick Dal Santo had scans yesterday but Lyon said both would play. Steven Baker will be back from suspension.

Roos, whose Swans were beaten by St Kilda in round seven, said he had watched select clips of Saturday night's game but it was wrong to expect eight inspiring matches would be played every week.

"I'm not going to comment specifically on Hawthorn-St Kilda because I didn't really see the game," he said. "But I just can't believe, generally, the hype that exists about so-called bad games. It's unprecedented in my time in football where we focus so much on bad games and we forget how many good games (there are). It's just absolutely mind-boggling that there can be so much focus on it. Whether it's the NBL, the NBA, the Premier soccer league, I guarantee there's not one league in the world that will throw up eight fantastic contests or 10 fantastic contests every single weekend. It just doesn't happen. I think it's the romanticism about the way the game used to be played. I think maybe that's what drives it."

It was Lyon rather than Hawthorn's Alastair Clarkson, who received most of the criticism in the aftermath of the poor spectacle.

"I think we as coaches understand that at some point we're going to be in the gun," Roos said. "So when it's your turn you put your helmet on, you put your box, you put your pads on, you make sure you've got your chest protector and you go into bat and that's all you can do.

"It was Dean Laidley five weeks ago, it was Kevin Sheedy last week, it was Terry Wallace after the Geelong game."