HAWTHORN assistant coach Adam Simpson admits Lance Franklin is dealing with a level of frustration as he prepares to return from a one-match suspension.
Franklin missed the start of the season when serving the second of a two-game suspension for a high bump on Richmond's Ben Cousins, missed round four for making high contact with Bulldog Jason Akermanis and sat out last week's game for high contact on Swan Martin Mattner.
Simpson maintained Franklin didn't have an underlying flaw in his game, but admitted the coaches would watch him intently to see if there was anything that could be worked on.
"It's frustrating [for him] because he's not in the side and he doesn't get that consistency and that flow that he needs," Simpson said from Melbourne Airport on Friday, where the team left for Saturday's match against Adelaide at Aurora Stadium.
"It's important that we recognise what he's doing wrong and try to change it, but it is difficult at the moment.
"I don't know what more Buddy can do, unless he just corrals every time he gets near a ball. It's a worry but he knows what he's got to do. He's got to try his hardest to avoid the high head contact. I think he's a 'ball' player - he goes the ball all the time so I'm not sure what else he can do.
"We'll keep monitoring him and if we see anything we can help him out with, we'll do it."
Franklin comes into the side along with Beau Muston and Ryan Schoenmakers, who replace Chance Bateman (suspended), Clinton Young (quad) and Liam Shiels (quad).
Simpson was cautiously optimistic that the Hawks' past month - snapping a six-game losing streak with a run of four wins - has put their season back on track.
"You wouldn't say our form has been amazing, but we've got the wins and our confidence is getting stronger," he said.
"Another win this week will probably get us to where we want to be.
"Winning form is good form and they (the players) have been a bit scratchy. We had one really good win against Carlton but we've done the job. We dropped a couple of close ones earlier in the year, but it does have the feel that we're getting our season back on track at the moment."
Simpson felt there was more to Adelaide than a huge one-off effort to upset Fremantle in Tyson Edwards' farewell game.
"They've been in good form," he argued.
"They've won two out of three, they've got their structures in place that are winning them games [now] so it's going to be a reasonably big challenge tomorrow.
"We're not taking them lightly."
