Young Hawk Harry Morrison says he is hopeful his performance against North Melbourne last weekend is a sign of things to come in 2021.
Morrison recorded 30 disposals, six tackles and four clearances in the side's promising 39-point victory against the Roos.
The 22-year-old said, while he was cognisant of the imminent returns of some of his star midfield teammates, he was anticipating more on-ball minutes in his fifth year in the brown and gold.
"With the likes of Jaeger and Tom to hopefully return ahead of Round 1, I will probably return to more of a wing role in the future weeks and let them do their thing," Morrison said.
"But it was great to be able to get some midfield exposure throughout the game against North.
"Hopefully I will be able to pinch hit on the inside there throughout the year."
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With the Hawks tallying two wins from two games against Western Bulldogs and North across the side's campaign preparations, Morrison believes the successful outings were a result of some fresh ideas over the summer.
"We've changed a few things - we've had a bit of a personnel change with Craig McRae coming in as a forwards coach from Richmond.
"He's brought a lot of energy and a new perspective to the table.
"As well as a few structural changes and tinkering with some game-style things so we're excited to see how we go in Round 1 against Essendon where we will hopefully see a lot of our hard work over the summer pay off."
One of the highlights to come out of the Hawks' win last week was the performance of young defender Changkuoth Jiath.
Morrison said Jiath's impact on the game came as little surprise to his teammates who had watched on as he had delivered clearly his best pre-season to date.
"That's just a credit to the work he's put in over the summer.
"He's been a clear stand-out all pre-season and even before Christmas when it was just the young boys training and he's been able to carry that through into games which is great to see.
"I think everyone is pretty happy to see that his work is paying off and we're pretty excited about what we think he can bring to the table for us."
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Key forward Jacob Koschitzke was another Hawk whose performance in the AAMI Community Series was filled with excitement, finishing with six goals.
Morrison reiterated that it was another example of hard work paying off.
"Similar to CJ, I suppose - he has put in a mountain of work over the summer.
"It's been a big change for him, he was a key defender this time last year.
"So, again, I think he's done a lot of work with Craig McRae and putting some serious time into working out his running patterns as well as some extra hours in the gym - he's a big boy now.
"Clarko calls it the "lick of the ice cream", and Kosi certainly got his against North which was great to see."
Morrison also hinted at the idea of captain Ben McEvoy and fellow ruckman Jon Ceglar spending splitting their time in the ruck again in 2021.
"On the weekend it seemed to work having a genuine ruckman in the contest and then having one spare forward providing good options for us.
"I think with the talls that we have down there plus a resting ruck it can be a pretty dangerous forward line down there.
"But I'll leave those final decisions up to the coaches."
