St Kilda star's close call with flesh-eating sea bugs

St Kilda midfielder Koby Stevens has revealed he was on his way to Brighton beach when an email arrived about the 'sea lice' who tore up a Melbourne teenager's legs on the weekend.

Sam Kanizay, 16, went for a 30-minute dip at Dendy Street Beach in Brighton on Saturday evening and walked out with what his family said were tiny marine creatures eating his legs.

Sam's father Jarrod said the creatures "ate through Sam's skin" and left him bleeding profusely.

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After realising they could not stop the bleeding, the teenager was rushed to hospital where staff were baffled by the "pin-sized holes" all over his legs.

With Sam's situation all over the news, the Saints were cautious about their players completing a recovery session in Brighton.

The club is based in Seaford but most players live closer to Melbourne in suburbs such as Brighton and St Kilda itself.

St Kilda defeated West Coast at Etihad Stadium, a notoriously hard surface, on Sunday, with the cool waters of the beach crucial ahead of the next weekend's game.

"I've still got my feet today," Stevens joked to reporters on Monday.

"Me and Sammy Gilbert were actually on our way down to the beach and we got the email from Matt Hornsby, our fitness guy, telling us not to go in.

"The whole group got the message of the young bloke who nearly had his feet eaten off down at the beach."

While the Melbourne boy is in hospital and the incident remains a worry for Brighton beachgoers, Stevens was actually already mildly concerned about the issue.

"A couple of weeks back one of my mates was down the water and he came out with blood on his feet as well," he said.

"You really need your feet for this game, so we were advised not go down there."

No one is quite sure what attacked the teenager Sam but his curious father conducted an experiment on Sunday.

Jarrod took a net full of raw meat into the water, with his video showing hundreds of creatures attacking the meat.