HAWTHORN coach Alastair Clarkson has blamed a lack of hunger for his side’s shock loss to Port Adelaide and forecast changes to the team.

The Power were without siblings Peter and Shaun Burgoyne as well as captain Domenic Cassisi but were still able to run away with a 30-point win after the scores were level at three-quarter time.

However, Clarkson said the writing was on the wall well before the last term fadeout.

“When the game needed to be won early in the game we weren’t tough or hard enough,” Clarkson said.

“The bottom line is that we didn’t have the same intensity or hunger for the contest that we did the week before against the Kangaroos.”

The loss leaves the Hawks’ teetering in the bottom eight with just one win from four matches.

And Clarkson said it was obvious that his side came back to the pack if they didn’t attack the game with ferocity.

“We got what we deserved today,” he said.

“If you are not hard enough at the footy and don’t work hard enough for one another then you are likely to lose games of football.

“We were outstanding in area last week against the Kangaroos and we were poor today.

“And that is the thing we need to rectify hopefully sooner rather than later because we are now 1-3 and we need to work hard to get ourselves back to level pegging.”

Hawthorn now heads to Launceston to play West Coast on Anzac Day.
It is a must-win game for them to stay in touch with a top-four finish.

Clarkson said there was no doubt his side had the talent to make a strong run in 2009.

“We are a very, very good side when we are intense and hungry and work hard for one another but we are an ordinary side at best, as we showed today, when that intensity is just below par,” he said.

“If the intensity is not there then we have just got to keep turning over our players until we find ones that can apply it.

“We’ll bounce back don’t you worry about that.

“We have great faith in this group of lads that they’ll work hard and at some point in the season we’ll start stringing some games together which gives us a chance to play finals and go deep into September again.”

Clarkson said there was a chance Stephen Gilham would be fit to return next week and that Brent Guerra’s hamstring injury from Saturday may not be serious.