St Kilda captain Nick Riewoldt has called on commentators to ease off on their criticism of veteran Robert Harvey and midfielder Nick Dal Santo in the wake of last Friday's loss to the Western Bulldogs.

In his column in The Age on Tuesday, Robert Walls was scathing of Dal Santo's lack of defensive skills against the Dogs and said he put in a 'selfish and disturbing' performance, while former Hawthorn star Dermott Brereton has renewed his call for Harvey to stand down, arguing the 36-year-old made a mistake by opting to play on this season.

"People can tend to overreact in a circumstance like this and 'Harvs' went through it earlier in the season," said Riewoldt at Moorabbin on Tuesday.

"You underestimate great players like 'Dal' at your own peril and 'Harvs' is a very resilient man, he's a very strong character."

"Robert Harvey wasn't the reason St Kilda lost on Friday night and Nick Dal Santo wasn't the reason St Kilda lost on Friday night."

"It was a team effort and it was a poor team effort so we know that and we're going to turn it around this week."

Riewoldt described the loss to the Bulldogs as an aberration and said the Saints were well-prepared for this week's assignment against Geelong at Telstra Dome.

"We've debriefed the game very thoroughly, we know what we’ve got to do, we know what we did wrong and we're looking forward now to this week to coming up against the benchmark of the competition," said Riewoldt.

"Clearly we need to be a lot harder, we need to win more contested ball - you can't expect to win games serving up what we served up in the last three quarters on Friday night so that's what our focus is on this week."

"We've got nothing but total respect for them but that being said we're confident going in this week that we can match it with them."

Riewoldt said he expected Michael Gardiner, a late withdrawal against the Bulldogs with a calf strain, to be available this week, but he said no risks would be taken with the club's No.2 ruckman.