WHEN St Kilda lost to Hawthorn in round eight, Leigh Montagna had his jaw broken. And his team kicked only six goals in what was widely regarded as the worst game of AFL football in history.

Life is better now — especially after St Kilda won a heart-stopping clash against Adelaide on Friday night to keep its finals hopes alive. And Montagna has four plates in his jaw and a numb lip, but neither bothers him too much, and he is playing the best football of his life.

His team has won three of its past four games to keep in touch with September, and averaged 14 goals in that time, playing what Montagna believes is quicker, higher-scoring football that will mean things are different when the Saints meet the Hawks again next Saturday.

"We'll have a look at them this weekend, and hopefully we can do well. They gave us a touch-up last time in a pretty scrappy game but we've improved since then," Montagna said on Friday night, after the Saints' hard-fought win over the Crows.

"We've worked on a few things, and the important thing is that we're scoring more goals. They put a lot of numbers behind the footy that night, which made it hard to score, and we didn't handle it as well as I think we would now.

"We were missing some key players that game, but we've got them back and we've also worked on our scoring and on moving the ball a lot quicker. Hopefully, we can do that next week and get a better result."

Scoring was not the early story against the Crows, Adelaide kicking six of the first eight goals and moving the ball in what Saints coach Ross Lyon considered a much quicker, slicker style.

Slowly, the Saints ground them down. Robert Harvey and Lenny Hayes began to dominate the midfield, as Tyson Edwards had. Sam Fisher began to run from the back line, like Andrew McLeod was doing. But in Nick Riewoldt and Fraser Gehrig, St Kilda had more players on the end of their work.

Gehrig kicked four goals, and Riewoldt covered enormous amounts of ground, taking 18 marks and grabbing two of them very late, after goals to Brett Burton and Scott Welsh levelled the scores with less than three minutes left.

Justin Koschitzke went forward a lot, too, which unsettled the Crows even more. They had to move Ken McGregor from their forward line to defence after Ben Rutten injured his calf.

Adelaide didn't have as many good players as St Kilda, yet lost by only two late points, which might be a good sign. The Crows played well in parts but showed less initiative in others; like their season, their match didn't have much fluidity.

Montagna sat out only one match after he fractured his jaw in round eight, having hurt himself at a time when the Saints' injury list was very long. The likes of Matt Maguire, Jason Gram and Hayes have returned since then, and started to find the form Montagna knows has made it easier for other players to play at their best.

He said having a few more weeks to understand all the small things the team's new coach wanted to ingrain in the players had been important, too.

"It was always going to take time, with a new coach. There weren't any massive changes, but it was little subtle things that we needed to train up and work on," Montagna said.

"I think that's starting to work better now, but more than that, I think the boys' effort has really stepped up.

"We've focused on just giving our all, and really trying to work hard and do the basic things right. If we concentrate on that, the results should come along."