HAWTHORN coach Alastair Clarkson has praised the efforts of Lance Franklin and Sam Mitchell after the star duo played a huge part in delivering the Hawks their third win of the season on Saturday against West Coast.

The scrappy affair finally ended in a hard-fought seven-point victory to the Hawks, with six goals to Franklin and a 37-possession performance by Mitchell leaving Clarkson in no doubt where any post-match praise should be directed.

"We were perhaps lucky we had a couple of very influential players in Franklin and Mitchell," Clarkson said.

"If we hadn't have had those two boys today we would have been in little bit of trouble to get the points.

"We started Mitchell on a half-back flank, but once he went into the midfield after quarter-time he gave us some really good drive and was one of the more polished players that we had in the middle of the ground.

"If it wasn't for him, we would have been in a little bit of trouble at the clearances.

"We kicked 10 goals today and [Franklin] kicked six of them. In a sense, if it wasn't for him we wouldn't have won the game. I don't think we're going to win finals games of footy if we've got a heavy focus on going through one or two players in our forward half."

West Coast was given little chance of causing an upset in Launceston, but appeared capable of doing just that for large periods of the contest.

Even when Hawthorn managed to get out to a 26-point lead late in the game, the Eagles came storming back.   

"We ended up getting well enough in front with five or six minutes to go that we should have won comfortably in the end, but it was a little bit like the game - despite us being up by four goals I don't think we were a four-goal better side today," Clarkson said.

"I thought West Coast played particularly well and, at different stages, were a better side than us on the day. We were really pleased to get the four points."

Despite reaffirming the star qualities of Franklin and Mitchell, Clarkson said there would be little to be gained from a thorough review of the match.

"We won't over-analyse the game; it was a pretty scrappy type of arm-wrestle, and we get the points and move on pretty quickly," he said.

"We just got a bit of ascendancy for about a 10-minute patch at the start of the last quarter, but that was the only real good flow that we had in the game as a side. The game could have gone either way.

"We're just happy to get early wins in the season, because the last couple of seasons we haven't been able to get off to a good start. We're 3-1 now and I'm just really pleased that we were somehow able to find a victory for ourselves today."