Former St Kilda captain and best and fairest winner Luke Ball could be on his way to Melbourne after the Saints failed to agree to a trade deal to send the star midfielder to Collingwood on the final day of AFL trade week.
Ball was the one big name that failed in his bid to change clubs in a trade week that saw 23 players change clubs - well up on last year's measly tally of six.
And not only did Ball fail to get to the club of his choice but the Saints have now withdrawn their previous offer of a new three year contract for the 25-year-old, who was taken at pick two in the 2001 'super' draft either side of superstars Luke Hodge and Chris Judd.
Ball was keen to leave the Saints after being frustrated at the treatment he received from Lyon this year when he not only spent time in the VFL but even when he did play in the seniors was used sparingly on and off the bench despite his status at the club.
However the Saints rejected Collingwood's offer of two draft picks - selection numbers 25 and 62 - in exchange for Ball, who now has little option but to nominate for the pre-season draft where wooden spooners Melbourne have first pick and can now select him for nothing should they choose.
Speaking after Friday's 2pm trade deadline, Lyon hardly threw the welcome mat out for Ball in terms of a return to Moorabbin.
"He has two clear options," Lyon said of Ball.
"One is to come back to St Kilda and train and deliver the actions that get you get selected in the senior team or go in the pre-season draft and take your chances."
Lyon confirmed the club had 'rescinded' its previous offer of a new three year deal for Ball but denied there was now bad blood between the club and one of its most respected players.
"We need to go away and assess what has happened but we certainly respect Luke," he said.
"We just couldn't get a deal done - there was (draft picks) 25 and 62 on the table (from Collingwood) but we were unlikely to use 62 and in our view 25 wasn't going to get the deal done.'
"We didn't think that was an equitable deal so we stood our ground."
Lyon said the club had explained its position to Ball and said it was now up to the 2006 captain and 2007 co-captain 'to go away and assess what he wants to do'.
Despite bringing in Andrew Lovett from Essendon and Brett Peake from Fremantle during trade week, Lyon said the Saints still had room in their salary cap to accommodate a new deal for Ball should he decide to remain with the club.
The failure of Ball to get to his club of choice despite having served the Saints loyally for eight years and 142 games will again raise the spectre of free agency - which the AFL Players' Association has been pushing for to enable experienced players to be able to move to their club of choice more easily.
However AFL football operations manager Adrian Anderson said while he felt sorry for Ball, he said this year's trade period showed that free agency was not needed given the higher number of players that were able to find new homes compared to previous years.
He said that was due to several changes made by the AFL including enabling clubs to swap picks for picks, even when players weren't involved, as well as allowing rookies to be traded (which enabled Geelong ruckman Shane Mumford to move to Sydney) as well as allowing for AFL run mediation sessions to enable clubs at loggerheads to complete deals as occurred with the Shaun Burgoyne move from Port Adelaide to Hawthorn.
"The fact is we have had 23 players find new homes and the relaxed rules to enable trades to happen more freely is a good thing because it means a club that loses a player is getting something in return whereas obviously with free agency that would not produce the same result (with clubs losing players for nothing)," Anderson said.