Their three victories at the MCG, a ground where the Saints have struggled in the past, would also stand them in good stead for the next season.

St Kilda did not need to play their best football to beat an insipid Richmond by nine points at the MCG on Saturday afternoon.

Tigers coach Damien Hardwick conceded his players did not make enough of an effort in the first half of the game, saying he expected better of them despite the fact that they were nearly at the end of the season.

Richardson said he had been annoyed that St Kilda had been so dominant in the first half yet held the lead by only 21-points at the main break.

"That's always frustrating, when the guys have worked their backsides off and haven't quite been able to make a bigger gap," he said.

But the senior coach said although Richmond lifted in the third quarter, he never really doubted that the Saints could hold on to the lead, thanks to the good work of their defenders.

"Even when they did have their moments, I just thought our match-ups, our back six, our team defense ... what we were trying to do from a team point-of-view certainly gave me a bit of comfort," he said.

Richardson said young Paddy McCartin had played well early in the first quarter, booting two goals, before he broke his collarbone and spent the rest of the game on the sidelines.

But he said he was glad McCartin had suffered the the break rather being knocked unconscious for the fourth time this year.

Richardson said the 20-year-old would only miss one game, St Kilda's last for the year and would be able to keep training in preparation of 2017.

"He's had a luckless run on the back of putting his head in the hole for his team and his teammates," he said.

St Kilda will have the opportunity to finish the season with 12 wins and 10 losses when they play a struggling Brisbane at Etihad Stadium next week.

Despite narrowly missing the final eight, Richardson said it had been a mostly good year for the rebuilding Saints.

"We've done that a bit this year, teams that have beaten us for a fair while we've been able to get on top of," Richardson said.

"There are some pretty clear indictions of heading the right way."

Richmond played three good quarters against Geelong the week before, then allowed them to kick six goals in the final quarter to win the match.

Hardwick said teams often started new games in a similar manner to how they had finished the one the week before and he had tried to counteract that with his players in training during the week, but it had not worked.