St Kilda champion Lenny Hayes has reflected on the club’s agonising premiership near misses during his celebrated 297-game career.
Hayes was inducted into the Australian Football Hall of Fame on Monday night, but the much-loved Saint would happily swap his individual honours for a flag.
During Hayes’ time at Moorabbin, St Kilda lost two Grand Finals in 2009 and 2010 and three preliminary finals in 2004, 2005 and 2008.
The courageous midfielder won the Norm Smith Medal in the dramatic drawn Grand Final against Collingwood in 2010.
“Not achieving the ultimate, which is what you play for, I think any player would swap any individual accolades to achieve that ultimate success as a team,” Hayes told SEN Mornings.
“You’d struggle to deal with it if you held back and you didn’t do everything you possibly could to try and win. For us, it just didn’t fall our way.
“What I do is admire the teams who can go on and win two or three in a row because I know how bloody hard they are to win.
“It’s just one of those things … it is disappointing because I would have loved nothing more than to enjoy that (win a premiership) with my mates and also the supporters. It just wasn’t meant to be.
“Do I dwell on it? Every now and again you do and when you’re watching Grand Finals now you can envisage it would have been so good to feel that … but it wasn’t meant to be.”
Hayes is the 19th St Kilda player to enter the Australian Football Hall of Fame.