HAWTHORN coach Alastair Clarkson has warned his players they'll be quickly dumped out of the finals if they don't learn a few key lessons from their 41-point defeat at the hands of Richmond on Saturday.
The Hawks, who are short-priced premiership favourites, produced one of their scrappiest performances of the season against the Tigers, conceding six goals to two as they fell away badly in the last quarter.
"We need to be a hell of a lot better than that if we want to be a good finals side and playing consistent footy through finals," Clarkson said after the match.
"We haven't played that badly for some time, so we've got some work to do.
"We played a good side today. They out-hunted us, and as soon as they were able to do that, then we were chasing leather and chasing Richmond jumpers and that makes it pretty difficult.
"But we've played some really good footy through the course of the year, and that one just came out of the box for us."
It was Hawthorn's second loss to Richmond, who is coached by Clarkson's former understudy Damien Hardwick, on the trot.
In round nine last season the Hawks went down to the Tigers by 62 points, and Saturday's result was their heaviest defeat since then.
"Maybe there's a script out there somewhere that they're working to," Clarkson quipped. "We'll have to go and pinch it from Dimma's joint."
Hawthorn's much-vaunted midfield was given a lesson by the Tigers' emerging band of running players.
"You're always going to look pretty ordinary when you're second to the ball like we were early in the game," Clarkson said.
"I think the stats around clearances early in the game were 16-2 down and 18 to zero in terms of first possession from a stoppage, so we were out-hunted by the Richmond side.
"We were actually really lucky to be only three goals down at quarter-time."
The Hawks held Richmond goalless in the second quarter and snared a two-point lead at the long break.
But the game turned when Matt White and Nathan Foley put the Tigers back in front midway through the third quarter.
Heavy rain was falling by then, and Hawthorn seemed unable to adapt its usually skilful game to the conditions.
"Once again, it comes down to the hunt on the ball," Clarkson said.
"They were first to it, and they had numbers that ran to support that contest a hell of a lot better than what we did.
"Ultimately, as old 'Yabbie' Jeans said, two will always beat one. He's right. They worked harder to outnumber than what we did.
"That gave them opportunities, even if there was a mistake, for that mistake to be mopped up. And they did that a lot better than what we did today."
Clarkson declined an invitation to brand the loss a wake-up call and also refused to criticise the amount of effort put in by his players.
"Our effort's been pretty bloody good for a long period of time," he said.
"We can throw darts and all that sort of stuff, but we'll have a look at the tape and get ourselves back on track for a game on Friday night against the Saints."
