HAWTHORN coach Alastair Clarkson says he’s looking forward to unveiling new recruit Stuart Dew during tomorrow's NAB Cup semi-final against Adelaide at AAMI Stadium.
According to Clarkson, the former Port Adelaide forward has been giving advice to the Hawks' younger players about conditions at his old home stadium.
“I understand during last week’s game against Fremantle there was a very strong wind from the south, so we asked Stuie yesterday if he could pass on a few tips to the boys about the ground,” Clarkson said.
“He’s played 180 games of league footy and I imagine about 100 of those would have been at AAMI Stadium so it’s a bit ironic that he plays his first game for us back at AAMI Stadium. He’s looking forward to it and we’re looking forward to seeing what he can contribute to the club.”
Clarkson dismissed suggestions that Dew has a point to prove after his selection during trade week attracted a lot of media attention.
“We think he’s got an enormous contribution to make to our footy club and we wouldn’t have selected him otherwise. We’re just looking forward to tomorrow night and he’s looking forward to it.”
Also returning for the Adelaide clash are Brent Guerra, Trent Croad, Rick Ladson and talented forward Jarryd Roughead. The latter's selection paves the way for Clarkson to experiment with a forward line already buoyed by the return of Mark Williams.
“Roughead’s obviously an important part of our structure but we’ve just got to work out over the next two weeks what our best structure is. As we saw last season, we played [Luke Hodge] down there from time to time and he did some really good things for us.
"That’s the beauty of Mark being available and Roughy coming back in tomorrow night. It just gives us enormous flexibility in our structure," Clarkson said.
"I don’t think at any stage, we’d like to have three or four guys who are permanently down there, we’d like to have the flexibility to roll about seven or eight guys through there because it makes it difficult for opposition sides to match up on us.”
One absentee for Hawthorn tomorrow night will be defender Campbell Brown, who’s serving a two-match suspension. Should the Hawks make the NAB Cup grand final, Brown’s suspension would be fulfilled before the season starts and Clarkson admits that the prospect of his availability in round one is a big motivation to win tomorrow night.
“Browny’s a very important part of our back six. It came into our consideration that if we accepted the two-week ban, he’d be able to serve it in the NAB Cup if we could get over the line. That’s not to say we’re going to get across the line with any great optimism, but we’re hopeful that we can [win].
“A lot of pundits out there are predicting that Adelaide are going to finish at the bottom of the ladder but I can’t see that at all, I reckon they’re going to be as competitive an outfit as they have been over the last few years.”
