Two years back, former St Kilda niggler Steven Baker finally admitted to employing “dirty tactics” in his attempts to quell the influence of Gold Coast star Gary Ablett. The tagger revealed he used to punch the Brownlow winner in the arm and the sternum, stand on his toes, and knock him over away from play. Ablett could probably add a few more to that list.

The GC SUNS captain wasn’t the only player to fall foul of a player who was anything but a ‘Saint’ on the field, given his lengthy judiciary record which saw him sidelined for almost 30 weeks of his career for a variety of indiscretions. In saying that, there was no doubting Baker’s ability to keep quiet some of the best midfielders in the game.

Fast forward to 2014, and St Kilda may have unearthed another tagger who doesn’t find himself in the headlines in the same way Baker did, but is starting to rack up some high-profile ‘victims’ in just his second season of senior footy.

The name Tom Curren is unlikely to be on the lips of the average footy fan, given on Monday night he played just his 15^th game of AFL in the Saints’ loss to Carlton. Already this season ,though, he has managed to keep the likes of Bernie Vince (13 disposals), Adam Treloar (18), Luke Shuey (18), Patrick Dangerfield (10), Dyson Heppell (14) and Tom Rockliff (17) under wraps, despite his team’s tough start to the season. Against the Blues, Marc Murphy got the better of him tallying 32 touches, but as commentator and former Brownlow medallist Gerard Healy noted, he had to “work hard for each and every one of them”.

Regular run-with man Clinton Jones got the job on Ablett when the teams last met in round 22, 2013, as St Kilda pulled off a 46-point win, while Curren spent most of the match keeping a close check on Harley Bennell. Jones has been given more of a free-running role this season, with Curren getting the lock-down jobs to date, which points towards him going one-on-one with Ablett on Sunday at Etihad Stadium.

Saints coach Alan Richardson was effusive in his praise of Curren when he spoke about him prior to the clash with the Blues this week.

“Tom’s done some really good jobs for us this year; he hasn’t really been beaten,” Richardson said.

“He’s only a young man, but his concentration, his discipline and his commitment to his team and his teammates has been outstanding.”

Curren was awarded the Robert Harvey Most Professional Player award at St Kilda’s Best and Fairest presentation last year.