St Kilda star Dan Butler has suffered a suspected dislocated elbow during his side’s thrilling loss to Sydney on Sunday afternoon.

Butler was attempting to tackle Swan Sam Wicks when Saints teammate Max Heath came in from the other way.

WATCH THE VIDEO ABOVE: Dan Butler suffers gruesome dislocated elbow (graphic warning).

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As Heath stuck the tackle, Butler’s arm got caught and copped the full brunt of force from his teammate.

The gruesome injury was clear for everyone to see as the tough forward lay on the ground writhing in pain.

Heath immediately recognised the seriousness of the situation and had his arm up in the air calling for trainers.

St Kilda kicked a goal from the resulting play which allowed for an extended stoppage while trainers attended to Butler.

“Horrible injury here for Dan Butler, he is in agony and play will stop for an extended period,” Channel 7 commentator Jason Bennett said.

He was able to walk off the field and went straight down to the rooms for further treatment.

“A definite dislocation as you can see from there. Soaking up the pain of that at the moment. The doctors will try to do their magic behind closed doors, thank goodness,” Channel 7 commentator Brian Taylor added.

“We don’t want to show you any further close-ups of that because it is a bit ugly. He is a tough young man, Dan Butler, that is for sure.”

He was quickly subbed out and replaced by Hunter Clark for the second half.

7NEWS reporter Theo Doropoulos said Butler could miss the remainder of the season.

“He came to the ground in significant pain. A normal recovery time is around 3-6 weeks on the minor end ... If this is 6-12 then obviously it is season over for Dan Butler,” he said.

“He was in significant pain. That is as nasty as they come. He will have further scans in coming days.

“If it is relatively serious then we would expect to see Dan Butler on the road to recovery in 2026.”

Sydney also had injury issues with defender Tom McCartin finishing the match on the bench after suffering a knock to the head.

McCartin copped a stray arm to the face from Heath in a marking contest and left the field under the blood rule following a cut to the cheek.

The club decided to rule him out for precautionary reasons, but later conceded he suffered another concussion.

The Swans backman has a history of concussions, and his brother Paddy was forced to retire from the AFL two years ago because of concussion issues.

“He’s OK now, we’ll just assess him in the next couple of days,” coach Dean Cox said after the match.

“We’ll support him, but he was walking around the change-rooms, which is really good.”

Cox said he was unaware of the contact from Heath, who collected McCartin in a marking contest.

“I saw Tom and my attention turned straight away to Tom and from there, what we’re going to do,” he said.

An added complication was that Sydney had already activated their substitute, meaning they were down to three men on the bench for most of the frenetic last quarter.

“My ideal thing with the sub rule is if you have five players there, why can’t they play? Do you need to have a sub? My thing is just play all five,” Cox said.

- With AAP