ST KILDA coach Ross Lyon says his playing group took a step forward in dispatching the Demons so convincingly on Sunday, but is well aware the Saints still have a long hard road ahead of them.

The final siren had barely sounded on St Kilda’s resounding 79-point win when the coach began to cast his eye toward next week’s clash against the high-flying Western Bulldogs.

“It was a real challenge coming here today, so to walk away with four points and a convincing win is pleasing for the psyche of the group, but all it puts us is five-five,” Lyon said.

“You don’t earn respect in a week. We’re five-five, so we’re in the hunt, but next week we go to the Western Bulldogs who have lost one game and are the form team of the competition. We’ll clearly go in underdogs and they go in red-hot favourites.

“I was down there yesterday in Launceston and their contests and pressure and tackling against the Hawthorn Football Club was outstanding. We’ll get a wake-up call pretty quick; there’s certainly no relaxing here.

“They’ll enjoy the next few hours and recover and have a little bit of banter, but from then on it’s the review and preparation for the red-hot team of the competition.”

On Sunday’s form his players will go into that match with their tails up. The Saints outclassed Melbourne in almost every facet of the game with their intensity at the contest a feature.

Lyon admitted it was a pleasing response for the fans after he put the heat on his players following last week’s defeat in Brisbane.

“If we didn’t respond today there would have been something drastically wrong,” he said.

“But the facts are we had every opportunity to win against Collingwood [the week before], we had more shots, more inside 50’s, so the optimist draws a line through the form and says you should be able to compete against most AFL clubs.

“I never lost faith in my playing group and they have clearly been supportive of their coach and [assistant] coaches, but until you get results it’s hard to stand there and deliver that to the public because they’ll question that.”

St Kilda’s half-back line monstered the Demon forwards all day with Brendan Goddard (28 possessions), Sam Fisher (27) and Jason Gram (27) running the ball out of defence with apparent ease.

“They had direct opponents, but what happened was our tackling pressure was really strong,” he said.

“We had 68 tackles, so forwards lead but when the pressure is so strong it forces high kicks and it goes over the forwards’ heads.

“The focus has been contested ball and tackling pressure and it gives an opportunity to defend well and, when you get the ball, warehouse your skills and your movement. If you haven’t got the ball you can’t attack.”

“I think Neil Craig spoke about AFL footy and that the intensity of tackling has gone up and we wanted to jump on board that and I thought today we delivered that.”

Former Swan Adam Schneider led all scorers with five goals and Lyon was pleased he was able to get back amongst the goals after a lean fortnight.

“I know Adam very well and he worked very hard on the track over the last couple of weeks,” he said.

“It hadn’t come [together] for him the week before, but it’s a very hard position to play, small forward, when your midfield’s not getting a lot of supply in.

“But I thought today he stood up and it started with him laying a tackle and the cream came later. We all know he can finish and kick goals.”