RYAN Schoenmakers is hungry to retain his place in the Hawks’ side with just five rounds to go in the home and away season.
Speaking to SEN this morning, Schoenmakers spoke of his desire to be involved in the Hawks’ finals campaign after making the decision to stay at the club during last year’s trade period.
“In terms of being involved in that success…I just wanted to be a part of it and to really have a crack at it and see what happens I guess,” he told breakfast program Morning Glory.
“A really pretty simple decision, really.”
Relishing the opportunity to play predominantly forward this year, the 24-year old is enjoying the change, but is still aware of the challenge that faces him.
“It’s been a nice sort of change, a bit of a fresh start for me. I played a lot there as a junior so it’s been good this year to really get up and play a bit of a different role so I’m enjoying the challenge at the moment.
“(But) I obviously know the position I’m in this year and I know that I’ve got to be at that level to maintain my performance so that’s just part of playing footy.”
Schoenmakers also said that, despite their 18-point defeat to Richmond on the weekend, that the Hawks wouldn’t be making any drastic changes to the way they play.
“We’ve still got to go out and play our style of footy and we think that if we can do that on a regular basis we’ll be have a good chance in most games, it’s just that unfortunately we didn’t do that on the weekend.”
Hawthorn this weekend travel to Perth to take on West Coast in a battle to keep their top-two aspirations alive.
“Yeah absolutely, this match is going to be absolutely crucial in that they’re probably the form side of the competition at the moment, they’re playing some great footy so it’s definitely going to be a big task this week so were going to have to be on our game.”
