CAMPBELL Brown says it is crunch time for the reigning premiers in next week’s Anzac Day game against West Coast.

The Hawks slumped to their third loss in a month when they went down 17.13 (115) to 12.13 (85) to Port Adelaide at the MCG on Saturday.

They sit 11th on the ladder and have a slim margin for error as they try to repeat their heroics of 2008.

And it all starts next Saturday against the Eagles.

“It is going to be huge for us,” Brown said of the clash at Aurora Stadium on Saturday.

“We’ve really got to bounce back now.

“We are 1-3 which is not a great start and you could say we’ve lost players and this and that, but at the end of the day the game was there to be won again today and we didn’t do that.
“It is about time we stepped up and really made a contest of it next week.

“We’ve never played on Anzac Day before and it is a special day that we are looking forward to.

“We all know the importance and significance of it to Australia.”

Brown formed part of an undermanned defence that leaked 17 goals on Saturday but he said the tactical battle had been won at the other end of the ground.

“I think Port got off to a good start and I think we let the game be played on their terms,” Brown said.

“We had a couple of things we put in place before the game to try and nullify Port Adelaide and I don’t think we did that very well.

“They clogged up the corridor and we couldn’t seem to get the ball into open space when we did go inside 50.

“They had obviously done a fair bit of work on that during the week because they were continually dropping three and four blokes in front of (Jarryd) Roughead and (Lance) Franklin.

“We were also second to the ball a lot today.”

He also lamented the mounting injury toll which has seen the Hawks take the field without three of their best tall defenders in Trent Croad, Stephen Gilham and Grant Birchall.

“We haven’t had much continuity with our team, there seems to be three or four changes each week through no fault of our own with injuries,” Brown said.

“We lost Brent Guerra again today on top of Grant Birchall and Xavier Ellis last week.”