Young gun Seb Ross has continued St Kilda’s bad AFL pre-season injury run as they beat Essendon’s makeshift team by 50 points.

Ross limped off in the third term of the 15.11 (101) to 8.3 (51) win late on Saturday afternoon at Morwell.

Essendon’s foreign legion of top-up players impressed, but the Saints kicked away in the last term with six goals to one .

Ross, who was best afield until he had to go off, ended the game with an ice pack high on his left leg.

Fellow rising star Luke Dunstan also was hobbing in the third term, but he returned to the field in the last quarter.

Jack Billings, Dylan Roberton and Shane Savage all have had hamstring problems in the last few days, prompting the Saints to review their travel and recovery.

Farren Ray will miss the first two months of the season after needing surgery to repair a hamstring tendon, but that was a more acute and unusual injury.

St Kilda finished bottom last year after using 42 players and they can ill afford another run of injuries.

Acting captain Jarryn Geary and Leigh Montagna, playing across half-back, impressed for the Saints.

First-round draft pick Hugh Goddard had his debut run for the Saints in the NAB Challenge and impressed in defence.

Former Saint Clinton Jones and ex-Geelong key defender Mitch Brown were among the top-up players who stood out for Essendon.

Senior-listed forward Shaun Edwards kicked three goals for Essendon.

The Bombers kept the pressure on St Kilda, but were outclassed in the last term.

Essendon surprised by selecting four players for this game who had been at the club in 2012 – Nick O’Brien, Jackson Merrett, Elliott Kavanagh and Lauchlan Dalgleish.

The other players from 2012 are not playing while the club awaits the verdicts from the AFL anti-doping tribunal.

Essendon also tried to rest six players from this game and give them a run on Friday in an informal hitout, which was organised for the benefit of the 2012 players.

But the AFL stepped in and said if those six were not playing in Morwell, they could not take part in Friday’s special training run.

The six players have joined the club since 2012.

One of them is star onballer Brendon Goddard, who was in the crowd of 5542 at Morwell.