St Kilda’s big Easter Saturday clash with Melbourne sums up the tipping nightmare through the first month of the AFL season.

Before round one, no one would have been surprised that one team has made a 3-1 start and the other is in trouble at 1-3.

Only it would have been the other way around.

The Saints, widely tipped to finish in the bottom four, are growing in confidence after Sunday’s fighting win over Hawthorn.

Having made last year’s preliminary final, the Demons had their first win of the season in round four.

Melbourne will start favourites, but the Saints regain captain Jarryn Geary and will start midfielder Jack Steven.

St Kilda will fancy their chances of another upset win.

“The boys are really building belief, that if they can give great effort, if they commit themselves to the plan and to the system we want to play, then we’re a chance to beat anyone we come up against,” said coach Alan Richardson.

“Are we there yet? No, there’s still some areas we need to work on.

“We know we have a really strong opposition this week in Melbourne, who look like they have their game back on track and they went really deep into September last year.

“We’ll need to go to another level this week to make sure we’re in the contest, but the guys are up for the challenge.”

The Saints are only averaging 75 points a game and need to beef up their attack.

Dermott Brereton has joined them as a part-time assistant coach and he will work with their young key forwards.

Brereton links up with the new-look St Kilda coaching group which also features rugby league great Billy Slater in a leadership and development role.

“Any time you can get a real expert into your program, the work that Billy Slater is doing with our young leaders has been terrific,” Richardson said.

“Any of those levers that you can pull to go to any level is advantageous.”