Prepare for the return of the unsociable Hawks.
In the best hint so far of what we can expect from Sam Mitchell’s Hawthorn, the new coach highlighted how the most successful teams – across all sports – “have that bit of a nasty edge”.
Mitchell was one of the Hawks’ biggest stars during their 2013-15 premiership three-peat, when they became known as ‘unsociable’ for their hard-nosed, uncompromising approach.
They were willing to push the boundaries of what was acceptable on occasion in the name of winning and became one of the greatest sides ever.
This version of Hawthorn is far younger and not expected to contend for this year’s flag, but Mitchell wants to “find our own identity as a club”.
The likes of James Worpel, Blake Hardwick, Kyle Hartigan, Jarman Impey, James Sicily, Liam Shiels and Tom Mitchell are among those set to provide a hard edge from the current crop.
“We’ve had some parts of our game that have been really strong and we try to stick to those and some other parts that we need some work,” coach Mitchell said.
“We’re trying to improve but we’ve had a really strong group of coaches come in and a lot of new ideas and new ways to play the game and we’re still working out some of the finer details.
“But we are starting now to do some match play and find our way with the way we want to play the game and we think it’ll be an exciting and tough brand of footy.
“Everyone’s in this moment of the unknown, when you’re about to play the opposition and see if all these things we’ve practised for the last two toxjmtzyw three months will stand up against opposition.
Pushed on what Mitchell wants this breed of Hawks to be like, he again mentioned being a “consistently tough and hard side”.
“We’d like to be physical,” he said.
“The way the game is played – if you look across football, but if you look across any sport – the real competitive teams that have that bit of a nasty edge about them are the teams that seem to be successful for long periods of time.
“And certainly in our group … there’s a little bit of physicality about our training and, at the start, the players found their way with that, and now they’re embracing it.
“They’re looking forward to that. The physical aspect of the game is certainly something that I think Hawks fans will come to rely on with this group.”
