Former St Kilda player Sam Fisher has received a jail sentence of five years and four months over drug trafficking and drug possession.

The 41-year old, who played 228 games for the Saints between 2004 and 2016, winning two club best and fairests and All-Australian selection in 2008, was arrested in 2022 after his involvement in a Western Australian drug smuggling operation was unearthed.

A police raid in May that year found large quantities of various drugs in Fisher’s home.

Fisher pleaded guilty to all charges a week before he was due to face trial in April, with his verdict handed down in the County Court of Victoria on Thursday.

According to reports, the former Saint was left in tears by the ruling.

He will not be eligible for parole for the first three years of his sentence.

At the sentence indication, Judge Mullaly described the charges as ‘a well and truly dreadful and out of character episode’, commending Fisher for his efforts to rehabilitate himself since being arrested.

“No matter how talented you are, drugs can take a hold of you and ruin your life; that’s the message he’s been imparting so others can avoid his path,” he said.

The court was told Fisher faced as severe a penalty as a life sentence, according to reports.

Fisher was taken with pick 55 in the 2003 AFL Draft, quickly becoming a mainstay in St Kilda’s backline.

He won his first Trevor Barker Award as the Saints’ best and fairest in 2008 as a versatile ball-winning key defender, also being named on a half-back flank in that year’s All-Australian team, before winning the award again in 2011.