With Opening Round imminent and the Full Sweat documentary going live on Wednesday night, a trio of Hawks spoke on various radio programs this week ahead of the 2025 campaign.  

Below is a summary of what defender Karl Amon, midfielder Massimo D'Ambrosio and CEO Ash Klein had to say in their respective interviews. 

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Massimo D’Ambrosio featured on SEN's The Run Home.

On how he feels ahead of the club’s first game

“We're obviously feeling good. It's really exciting for us as a club, because last year we weren’t in many big games. So to be in round zero playing against Sydney up there on Friday night, I think we're all excited and ready to go. I think we've put in such a great, big pre-season and everyone's raring to go so it should be exciting.”  

On enjoying footy last season

“It was very nice. We started off the season zero and five and then to be able to make finals and do what we did, it was a pretty exciting time and it was a rollercoaster of events. But I feel like the group has just enjoyed every single moment and that's what made it so fun. Although our season did fall short last year, we're really looking forward to this year and what we can do and hopefully we can go one step better.”

On his self-belief after individual 2024 campaign

“Yeah, it does give me belief, but on that, I feel like I'm never satisfied with where I’m at. I could make the All Australian squad or team whatever, but I'm always going to doubt myself, and those doubts allow me to work hard and keep chasing what I'm after. I'm really after some team success, and hopefully we can get that this year, but I just want to keep believing in myself, and I think it’ll take me places.

“I try to leave no stone unturned. I go in with the intention every training session to get better and work heavily on my strengths but also try to tidy up my weaknesses. I’m working a lot on my game and I'm really looking forward to the season ahead, hopefully producing good things, but I'm really just looking forward to the process and me getting that right, so I'm really driven to get better."

On Sam Mitchell

“He's great. He has a very good balance of when to have fun and joy, but also to be hard on us. I feel like he's also leaning towards our players and us driving our own standards. He drives a lot of the standards but I think on the field, he's not there, so we need to drive those standards as well. He puts a lot of onus on us to be able to do that and I think we're in the right direction in terms of that stuff."

Hawthorn CEO Ash Klein spoke on SEN's Sportsday.

On the Full Sweat documentary

“I don’t know if it was a huge punt, but we certainly had consideration for it. Last year we met with Channel 7, as we do every season, obviously under a new direction there with Chris Jones. We had the conversation around things for the game, for the match day, for the year ahead and then they came and actually asked us a question about the Full Sweat doco and if we had any interest in it and we had a big conversation around the football club. We obviously spoke to Sam (Mitchell), our GM of Football Rob McCartney, spoke to our leaders, even our high-performance guys.

“But we’ve had a pretty open and transparent focus over the last couple of years within the four walls of our club, we certainly want to take our members on a pretty good journey with all that, and we’ve got cameras in amongst training and amongst the club every day within our own team so we thought it was a pretty good thing to do. It certainly opens it up to our members and our fans and that’s our main priority but it also opens it up to the footy public.

“The guys were fantastic, the team producing it and obviously Channel 7 have been fantastic in terms of knowing the areas that might be a little bit out of bounds but in the majority, as you’ll see we were pretty transparent, we allowed them into team meetings, into selections, and obviously the camp we had in the off-season, so we had really good faith and trust in the relationship and that was clear from the start and that carried all the way through to the end.”

On the Kennedy Community Centre

“It’s been fantastic, it’s obviously been years in the making. The vision to do this has come from a long time ago and the guys have done a great job from the start of last year, that was the turning of the sod moment in February last year, it’s come about so quickly. I think we’re about 80% of the way through.

“When you start seeing it, and the members and the fans and the players start seeing the grass and the turf being laid, then that being realised, the walls going up, the community pavilion, it’s everything to be excited about.  

“Some of the coaches went out the other day to have a look at the grass and the oval and it’s like a putting green out there at the moment, it’s in great knick, we’re very lucky."

Karl Amon was a guest on Nova FM.

On the season opener

“Footy’s around the corner! (We've done) lots of running and they’re (pre-seasons) getting shorter and shorter these days, which is good. But obviously we got a taste of finals last year and it’s going to be good to get back on the stage this week.

On the Kennedy Community Centre

“So we’ve got the Kennedy Community Centre, it’s a massive building, so end of this year we’ll be moving in which is really exciting. The boys are hoping we can get in before the end of the season because it’s brand-new facilities and it looks unbelievable.”

On the hype and expectation 

“There’s definitely a lot of hype around us this year, and we experienced finals last year and that’s where we want to get back to, so I think you’ve just got to embrace it, I think Sam’s (Mitchell) doing a really good job of embracing the hype around the club."