THE LATE Rob Dickson’s final completed project, The Essence of the Game, featured Hawthorn captain Sam Mitchell’s quest for a premiership as a central theme.

The pair worked closely in the making of the documentary and Mitchell was as shocked as anyone when news came through last Saturday that Dickson and his two sons Byron and Gabriel had died in a car crash in South Africa.

Knowing he had to captain his team in a match the following day, Mitchell says coping with the grief was a challenge in more ways than one.

“It’s such a tough situation. Part of you is really feeling for his family and everyone involved and missing him yourself,” Mitchell said.

“I went home and kissed my fiancé on the head and told her I loved her. You hold on a bit tighter to your loved ones. It was a pretty tough situation we went through but I think the boys handled it pretty well.”

Mitchell admits he is yet to come to terms with the passing of Dickson, who spent much of 2008 embedded with the Hawks as he filmed the documentary.

“He was one of those blokes who took it all before him. I had plans with him to catch up and talk about doing another doco in the States,” he said.

“I look in my phone and I’ve still got his phone number in there. It sort of feels a bit surreal. All my feelings go to his poor wife who has lost not just a husband but two kids as well.”

One of the final scenes in Dickson’s critically acclaimed documentary featured a shot of Mitchell walking on to the MCG after last year’s premiership as the reality of his success sunk in.

He said it was a moment that he would never forget.

“You always think about playing in a premiership and that is what you strive to do your whole life. When I watch that tape, I had one of those little moments where I realised I’m not at Auskick dreaming about it anymore. It’s actually a reachable ambition. It just made it a bit more real for me.”

Mitchell said that as captain he was conscious of trying to avoid a premiership hangover.

“It is part of what you do in any sort of leadership role. You try and manage the morale of your group and sometimes that means bringing them down a peg and sometimes it means pumping them up,” he said.

“Having never been in that position before, I wasn’t really sure what the morale would be like at the club when we got back. I suppose you always have a bit of concern about it but probably one of the big benefits we had is that it was such a young group and youth brings such enthusiasm. Perhaps when you get later in your career you start to look back on your achievements. But young guys take it in their stride and they don’t know any different.”

“It was really pleasing that our first couple of months of pre-season was as good as it has been in any year. They are a pretty easy group to manage.”

Mitchell is conscious of not dwelling on the premiership and is far keener to talk about Hawthorn’s 2009 campaign.

The skipper admits he was relieved to have finally got on the board with last week’s win.

“You don’t want to go 0-3 at the start of the year. It would be pretty tough to come back from there. We give ourselves a good chance when we play like that to beat a lot of teams in the competition and it was really pleasing the way we went about it,” he said.