THE AFL will review its potholed pitch at Marvel Stadium, labelled "absolutely atrocious" after hosting two matches at the Docklands stadium on the opening weekend of the season.

Large divots appeared on the sandy field during Sunday's clash between St Kilda and Gold Coast, a night after Western Bulldogs defender Matthew Suckling was injured after the surface shifted under him.

Players appeared to be checking their movements on the worst-affected areas, including the wing immediately in front of the team benches.

FULL MATCH COVERAGE Saints scrape past Suns

Suckling suffered an ankle injury in his side's win over Sydney on Saturday night, saying "the ground gave way" underneath him as he kicked.

He pulled his punches in a post-match interview, describing the ground overall as being in "pretty good nick".

Gold Coast coach Stuart Dew claimed he "didn't notice" the issue, even as an emergency umpire took it upon himself to go out to the ground and replace lost turf on the rotten surface.

A League spokesperson said head office had no comment but would provide one after a review.

St Kilda coach Alan Richardson said if the surface was found to be sub-par it would need to be fixed before their round two clash with Essendon next Saturday.

"The whole round, there's been a lot of mistakes from everyone," he said.

"The Bulldogs game was the same. I'm not sure if that's the surface or just blokes getting used to it again.

"If it is the surface that's responsible for blokes slipping over then of course it needs to be fixed. It will end up leading to injury."

Geelong great and Fox Footy commentator Cam Mooney linked the turf to a knee knock suffered by Suns skipper David Swallow on Sunday. "This ground out here along this wing is absolutely atrocious," he said.

"You can see where Swallow hurt his right knee, it was probably a little bit of that turf switching under him there.

"There's a lot of turf being thrown around. It's not great."

The turf wasn't the only issue to plague the stadium on Sunday.

Scoreboard operators had a bad day, giving two early Gold Coast goals to "J.Hogan" in a possible reference to the Fremantle forward.

St Kilda assistant Brendon Lade was introduced as Brendon Lake.

The sound controllers also had a day to forget, missing their cue as the Saints ran through their banner meaning the team broke through the crepe paper to the sounds of Swedish band The Hives.