Hawthorn coach Alastair Clarkson isn’t ready to declare Saturday’s surprisingly poor performance against Richmond the AFL loss the Hawks had to have, but he’s confident they can rebound.

Clarkson was left searching for answers after the Tigers dominated his side in the midfield in their 16.11 (107) to 9.12 (66) MCG win.

It was by far the Hawks’ biggest defeat since going down by 62 points to the Tigers at the MCG in round nine last year.

That proved a wake-up call to the extent that before Saturday, the Hawks had lost just four games since, three of those to bogey side Geelong by a combined total of 19 points and their 10-point grand final loss to Sydney.

So Clarkson wasn’t ready to go too hard on his side despite acknowledging the Tigers seemed more mentally ready for the clash, repeatedly beat Hawthorn to the ball and consistently outnumbered his players at contests.

“We need to be a hell of a lot better than that if we want to be a good finals side and playing consistent footy through finals,” Clarkson said.

“But we’ve played some really good footy through the course of the year and that one just came out of the box for us.”

Clarkson was unsure whether to read anything into the fact that his side’s two biggest losses in the past two seasons have both been against Richmond.

He was also reluctant to question his players’ effort.

“Our effort’s been pretty bloody good for a long period of time. We can throw darts and all that sort of stuff, but we’ll have a look at the tape and get ourselves back on track for a game on Friday night against the Saints,” he said.

Clarkson said it remained to be seen whether the Hawks would benefit mentally from the loss.

“Who’s to know? You never plan on losing games of footy,” he said.

But Tigers coach Damien Hardwick predicted the Hawks would come out seething against St Kilda on Friday night and that stars Lance Franklin, Jarryd Roughead and Cyril Rioli would bounce back from quiet performances.

“I pity the side that plays them next week,” Hardwick said.