A cagey Alastair Clarkson has declined to reveal whether Hawthorn will swing changes for Thursday night’s AFL clash with Port Adelaide.
The 14th-placed Hawks secured a morale-boosting victory over Sydney at the SCG last week but face a significant challenge against the Power at their Adelaide Oval fortress.
With the eighth-placed Power confirming they will go in unchanged from last week’s two-point loss to Geelong, Clarkson has opted for secrecy ahead of the Hawks’ second interstate trip in as many weeks.
“We’ll settle our side tonight. We’re not going to reveal anything now,” he said at Melbourne Airport on Wednesday.
“We face another confronting challenge again tomorrow night against Port Adelaide, who on their home patch are particularly hard to beat – that’s why we’re so cagey around our side and all that sort of stuff.
“We’ve had a very, very short break – two interstate travels (and) a six-day break.
“We need to use every minute that we’ve got to actually make sure that the side that we pick is the right one to play against Port Adelaide tomorrow night, and gives us the best chance of victory.”
Young key forward Tim O’Brien is in the mix for a possible return after recovering from hip soreness, while last week’s debutants James Cousins and Dallas Willismore both travelled to Adelaide.
Ty Vickery could also be retained to help Ben McEvoy against Port’s Paddy Ryder, who Clarkson labelled the season’s most influential ruckman.
Clarkson said the six-point victory over the Swans, capped off by skipper Jarryd Roughead’s match-winning goal, had lifted spirits after a tough start to the year.
“We lost our first four games of the season – that’s a challenge that we haven’t had to confront very often in the last 10 years, and that’s not easy to confront,” Clarkson said.
“It’s given opportunities to some of our younger players, some of the injuries that we’ve got at the present time, and that’s what was really pleasing about last week’s victory against a really respected opponent in Sydney on their home track.
“When you have those sort of victories, it does a lot for the morale around the footy club and says you’re heading in the right direction with your next crop of players.”
Power coach Ken Hinkley said the decision to line up unchanged against the Hawks rewarded his players’ consistency.
“We’ve played strong footy in every game we’ve been in, we’ve had a couple of down quarters, but other than that, we’ve been pretty honest,” he told radio station FiveAA.
“You back the boys in to keep playing the footy they have been playing.”
