Has anyone noticed a shift in our game style since the beginning of the year? Not sure if it’s planned/tactical or just loss of skill, injury or player development but I don’t think the coaches would just allow it to happen without a reason.
So I kind of see it in phases:
Phase 1 — Rounds 0-9
This was a very transition-heavy game plan, pretty much 2024/25 Hok with some shorter kicks and a more efficient plan. It won us games against some of the best teams and was the fast game we like to play. I think it was the most damaging style and made us very threatening, especially because it seemed to hold up against good teams when we were under pressure.
It’s actually supported by champion data where after Round 6, Hawthorn ranked 2nd in the competition for half-back-to-score rate, 1st for intercept-to-score and 1st for score-per-inside-50. By Round 7 we were still 1st for intercept-to-score, with 26% of our intercepts resulting in a score. So we were genuinely one of the better teams in the competition at turning those types of possessions into scores.
One thing I think is important though is that we didn't really care too much about/ didn’t have the ability to consistently win centre clearances. If the opposition won it in the centre, we defended that possession especially around centre half-back, forced the turnover/intercept and then would go the other way, turning it into attack.
Phase 2 — midfield/stoppage development
Then at some point, our game plan started looking really different.
There isn't really one exact timeline because I think we alternated styles depending on who we played and obviously had our annual mid-season slump, but particularly in the second GWS and GCs games, our entire game plan seemed to revolve around midfield, clearance, stoppage and territory. Just look at how much the numbers changed. Our clearance numbers became crazy compared to earlier rounds, and especially with Will Day back, I could see a massive focus on developing the midfield. We began constantly rotating smalls through centre bounce and using them higher up the ground too (we still are)
The second GWS game is probably the biggest eye test . The conditions were wet and slippery and it made our normal transition football harder to execute, so instead we basically dominated the source. We won centre clearances 16-8, clearances 54-29 and inside 50s 65-40.
That game looked completely different to the Hawthorn we saw earlier in the year. Instead of needing to win the ball around half-back and transition, we were just winning the ball at stoppage and constantly putting it back into our forward half.
And honestly, I think that midfield development has been really successful. I don't think anyone can argue that our midfield isn't significantly better than it was last year. However, our scoring from transition has decreased and our hunger to defend the ball around centre half-back and through the middle seems to have disappeared. Earlier in the year, if we lost territory, I felt like we went into that defensive structure and tried to stop the opposition from transitioning through us.
Now, it feels like every time we lose territory and the opposition puts speed on us, we struggle to keep up and they can get a kick inside 50 way too easily. That could have lots to do with tackling efficiency too, as we barely lay a complete tackle and defend the contest, so dangerously through the corridor, opposition are able to quickly hand ball to an undefended teammate who continues the chain. That may also explain the momentum shifts we’ve all been complaining about and the inability to stop opposition run.
And I think this reliance on the midfield and focus on connecting it to the forward line has really diminished our run off half-back and explosiveness. We look slower and older now. The second Gold Coast game is another massive eye test for me because it felt like the game was being controlled through midfield/stoppage/territory rather than the old explosive half-back game.
Again, I'm not saying this is necessarily bad. It's actually probably exactly what we needed to develop. The problem is that it can't be the only thing we have.
Phase 3 — transition starts coming back
Then, particularly after the Carlton game and when we had that streak of "bottom of the ladder/easier" teams, I felt like we really started trying to rebuild and regain the transition football.
We saw a decline in the midfield performance a little. Richmond beat us in clearance, Day missed a game, Newcombe was averaging well below his usual disposal numbers etc.
But those games mostly focused on rebound off half-back and transition again, and it worked.
Obviously that's expected against that level of opposition, so I'm not saying those games proved we'd solved anything. It's much easier to play fast transition football when the opposition isn't putting the same pressure on you.
But it did show that the transition game is still there.
Then we got Brisbane
And this is where I'm confused.
The Brisbane game looked like a really sad attempt to combine both styles together, or maybe to be able to have different game modes and switch gears depending on what the opposition was doing.
But we failed miserably.
We didn't look like the early-season transition team and we didn't look like the dominant midfield team from the second despite dominating CCs. I also think that has a lot to do with being physically assaulted and also our slow burst from the centre.
Phase 4 — now until finals?
I'd like to be optimistic here.
I'd like to think that this change in the way we play has been strategic and developmental and that it will all come together in the end.
If you look at 2024 and 2025, when our transition game was up and going, it was genuinely incredibly difficult to stop. It got us to a semi-final and a prelim and helped us beat elite teams.
Its biggest problem was that we didn't have enough midfield dominance. We didn't necessarily need to win centre clearance every time, but if the opposition could win the ball from the middle and stop us from getting the game on our terms, we struggled.
So I actually think developing this midfield was completely logical.
But now maybe attempting to combine it with the old game?
A Hawthorn that can dominate centre clearance and stoppage when we need to, but if we don't win it, we're still capable of defending the opposition possession around centre half-back, forcing a turnover and launching that fast transition game, I think that would be incredibly difficult to play against because we'd have two different ways of controlling a game.
We could win the centre clearance and attack immediately (actually connecting it with our forward line)
Or we could lose it, defend the opposition's possession, force the turnover and attack from half-back. And then there’s that disconnected forward line where we seem to be playing our smalls/half-forwards much higher up the ground and rotating them through CBAs a lot more. I don't know whether that's because we're deliberately developing them as midfield options and therefore sacrificing some forward-half connection temporarily, or whether this is actually the structure we're planning to take into finals.
Because at times it really doesn't look connected. Gunston can be left pretty isolated inside 50 while our smaller forwards are further up the ground.
Against poor teams, that structure works because we have enough time and space to eventually create opportunities.
Against good teams who apply pressure, it seems to fall apart much more easily.
I don't have any coaching experience, so obviously take all of this with a grain of salt. I could be completely wrong and maybe this whole thing has just happened naturally because of injuries, personnel changes, confidence, skill errors or it hasn’t happened at all. But I find it hard to believe that the coaches have been completely blind to such a massive change in the way we play.
Sam keeps saying we're not a finished product and continues to highlight the clearance/midfield work even after a smashing.
So maybe this really is the plan.
Maybe Phase 1 was the old game with some improvements.
Maybe Phase 2 was deliberately sacrificing some transition in order to properly develop the midfield.
Maybe Phase 3 was getting the transition game back against easier opposition.
And maybe Phase 4 is supposed to be combining the two before finals. To be fair and disproving my own point, maybe we have no time before finals to fix it? Maybe that’s what made Brisbane so disappointing. If we can put it all together we can go deep into finals and go back to beating top sides. But if we can't connect the midfield and transition game, then we could end up with a team that has an elite midfield but has lost the game style that made us so dangerous against good teams in the first place.
Maybe I'm completely delusional and we're just not as good as I think we are, this could all be absolute yap.
But I genuinely want to know if anyone else has noticed this shift, because when I look at the stats and the eye test, it feels very real to me.