Talking Footy - Hawthorn Coach Sam Mitchell 24th July 2024

take well Hawks were zero and five after five rounds of this AFL season since then they have turned the whole competition on its head so we can't think of a better time to welcome their coach Sam Mitchell Sam welcome to you what did you do in the week after that fifth round game to to create what has been the story of the season um we're still 11th so I don't think we're quite turning it on its head just yet so we still got some work to do we recognize that but I think I think in round five we finally um came to the understanding that the players need to be the ones to really take control of the group and and not rely on outside influences coaches and those things and it's something we' talked about a lot but it was the first time it really had sunk in and um I think Dylan Mo's interview um the next day where he said bring your mouth guards it was his words and I think that has rippled through the group and the the standard of what we've done since then we haven't got everything right but the standard of what we've tried to do is been been to a high level have you been blown away like in your Quiet Moments you're thinking wow this has actually been nuts yeah I mean I talked to the players quite regularly about sometimes as a coach the best moment is just when you don't want to touch anything just let them do what they're doing and there's been more and more of those moments as The Season's progressed and um you know I think the influence that you have as a coach you hope it's small because you have guys like these two leading your groups and and you look at James Sicily and Dylan Moore and Luke Bruce as our um Captain in two Vice Captain is what they've been able to do on the field without influence of coaches I think has taken us to to the next level but we we know that's not the level we need to get to I still watch the very best teams and think they're a step in front of where we are right now well you're playing with a lot of Joy your boys Mitch and I don't know if the old the Hawthorne of old would be treated the same way as what or ever thought of the way that you may coach this side but it's it's absolutely been enjoyable to watch yeah I think like when we watch there's been a lot of focus everything I see it's about the celebrations and they are celebrating a lot of good good things that one that one there as an example of why they celebrate um Dave McCay our opposition analyst he did this fantastic video saying when you play a team like Collingwood it's like two Rams going at each other and you have to meet it head on and and it takes two hours for these Rams to just headb each other until one gives up and no one will give up in a hton versus Collingwood game and so when Conor McDonald does that celebration he's actually shared out to the players to say to go back to what we were focused on as a team so I think you think it's individualistic but it's they're actually celebrating it together so I think that's that's why it's been embraced Mitch none of us who watched you play with the ridiculous hard Edge you played with can believe that a team that's underneath you is taking selfies after the game and I mean you have embraced this in a way that I don't think any of us who watched you and loved watching your play for so many years would have thought you would have I mean I think you have to you obviously move with the times and you have to coach to the group that you have if we were trying to get this group to behave in a serious manner they'd play in a different way would that make them play better I don't think so I think we'll evolve and at some point this will be thrown back at us to say look at them carrying on but what I have loved about this group is they were willing to do the goal celebrations early in the season when we were zipping five we were doing goal celebrations and there was people criticizing saying look at this they're seven goals down and carrying on but that's the joy that they want to play with I think Le a bit this year probably from an poer cogo and he he did a lot of stuff um overseas where he was talking about football's a hard Sport and when you get on a rooll and when you have goals you should celebrate them and your fans should celebrate them and um that means allowing the players to carry on a little bit Mitch you're an incredibly talented and knowledgeable player and as a coach obviously a lot of that is required but what is the most important or what is your greatest strength that is allowing you to flourish in the role senior coach um I think being surrounded by great people is is the most important thing um you know I think a lot of what you have to do as a coaches around management of people and so there's the on field and the coaching and the Tactical side of things but you know we talk fairly regularly that an average plan really well executed will beat a perfect plan poorly executed and so we always talk about can the players execute this and how can we coach it in the best way so it's coaches it's you know whether it's physios or support sport staff for mental skills all of these people go into making the mix right and then I think the the beauty of coaching is when it's going well you actually take your hands away and just let it happen and um when we've had our best games the coaches have done the least when you talk about execution it was fascinating at the weekend the way you played against Collingwood because the two previous losses that they' had teams had denied them the ball they played slowly they played deliberately why did you go after Collingwood the way that you did which CU it looked like you're actually playing into the hands of the way they wanted to play yeah when you I mean when you Scout Collingwood is really interesting um when you Hawthorn because the way we would like to play is quick and affluent and and play with some vibrancy and take a bit of risk but when you play against Collingwood that's exactly what sets their game up and so in the planning there was a bit of which way do we go and probably the Tipping Point was the weather we weren't sure about the weather we thought it was likely to be wet so if you wanted a ball control play and you wanted to take 120 marks against them um then that was going to probably be difficult so we decided just don't talk too much about offense and just let the players play and that's when we've when we've coached our best and when our players have done the best job is when they've been left alone as far as offense goes so on the weekend we saw um that really hard Edge come into what you're doing and I mean we go back to the sides you played and that's what Hawthorne were famous for and um so get do all celebrating you like but you still got to win the footy when it's around your area and that's what you're doing brilliantly across the ground yeah I mean I think the focus from the public perspective is obviously the celebration on and what happens after the ball goes out of bounds and after the Umpire has it back in his hands but for us very little of what we focus on is about that you know we're talking about Minor Details of the game and um very early in the game there's a m or CH Chase where he chases Noble he doesn't quite get to himn but it's a terrifying this big guy chasing you and just getting a finger on your right as you kick it and the and the influence that when he puts that pressure on he has um you know they're the things that we value and so we don't talk too much about the celebrations um Adrian hitmart does like to show the celebrations as the forwards coach but the rest of us we focus very much on the small things that we value within the within the game Mitch I think about this year and how it's played out for the Hawks um the relationship that you have with scrimshaw to have the conversation that you needed to have at the time the Nick Watson goal kicking at the moment that we're here that you're having the Hands-On approach so you're saying you have the hands off but I want to go back to 2022 and the treatment or the coaching that you put James waral under played 11 games in the AFL that year and spent a lot of time in the vfl he is become an outstanding player for you guys uh here I mean he James wle is a bit of a coach's dream and he's the guy that you want to have success because you want to be able to point at him and say see if you do the work it might not all be easy but it'll come good in the end um and I think when you look at James wle he he's the guy who's always in the gym he's always first on the track he's always working on his craft and so when those guys start to flourish it's a really good for a coach because you can say to everyone else see if you keep working at it this is what this is what you'll get even if there are bumps in the road so you know he's best and fairest winner at very young age 20 years old and then he's playing in the twos a couple of years later it doesn't sound like a fairy tale story but because of the work ethic that's behind it you know that his trajectory is going to be strong and he's been he's been brilliant for us this year I'm talking about another star of your team Jack ginan I mean there's a lot of people out there that probably hate the way he plays but when he's inside your four walls have you seen more than what you expected from him um I mean I think obviously we saw him last year as um an antagonist and he's did a lot of things in his first couple of years as a player I think when I when I started to look at him as a potential option for us after meeting him I realized he was 20 years old and you think about what he had done in his life and where he'd been and the amount of Back Pages he'd been on and some front pages and you're saying okay this guy's 20 years old and he's already a Premiership player he's got huge football IQ which was very very quick to to pick up and what i' learned pretty quickly was that from a leadership perspective I think he's got an enormous amount of upside he's great at watching Vision he's great at helping other people with their patterns and explaining different aspects of the game so when you add those things together the only thing left was does he have the work ethic and it didn't take us very long to realize that he did so I'm not surprised by what he's done it's probably happened as quickly as I would have hoped or maybe a little bit quicker um but he's still he's still scraping the edges and I think there's more growth in in Jack in's game and Sam you're always looking to improve your team and Hawthorne have looked at Players you uh restricted free agents free agents that type of player your club's name has been linked to Tom Baris in recent times as well you would know him having spent time with him at the West Coast Eagles is he a player that you are interested in yeah I think every player um at the moment that's up is a free agent I think we've been linked to all of them at the moment um I think that market is is something that's changed enormously since um you know certainly since I finished playing and I I think that it's not fair for coaches to talk about what players are doing in their positions that they're in but um I think every head coach and I've said this before every head coach would love to be able to improve their list for the next year and whether that's through the draft free agency or trades they're all um there all ways to do it so any talented players we think will help us will obviously be talking to are you still you've gone after a couple of the key position players defensive players as well is that still an area that you're trying to bolster as quickly as you possibly can again yeah I mean we've been a little bit unfortunate with you know our injury list at this at the moment is quite strong but the two um you know the two big ones is so we had James blank go down with his knee in the preseason he missed the whole season and Mitch Lewis has now had his knee reconstruction as well so sort of a center half forward and a fullback is the two positions that you know from a list profile point of view that we would like to look into and obviously everyone would love some more explosive midfielders in their in their game so there's three things that we look at but anyone who's High Talent you're obviously you're obviously looking if you can bring them into your organization so a couple of the unheralded players because we all look at will day and Marvel and you know the stars are are the stars at all the clubs but you brought in masod Ambrosio and Lloyd Meek and they have both been unbelievably good are you Amazed by that or from what you see on the track is is that what you expected I mean I think you have to figure out where your value is and and if you looked at freem manle they've got sha Darcy who is very very young and very very good and Jackson was going going there and that was the rumors at the time and so Lloyd Meek was someone who um you know I'd seen a little bit as a as a as a tall over there and and it was unlikely he was going to get too many looks and so being able to lure him over has been great for us and a bit like James warpo he does everything right he spent most of last year in the vfl um and and started this year in the vfl so it's not like he's a finished product yet either he's only 25 years old so expect a fair bit of growth in in Lloyd and Massimo I mean he was someone who I really liked in the in the under 18s under 19s and then when he went to Idan in the midseason he was someone I'd kept an eye on because you sort of had watched him when he was when he was a junior and when when the opportunity came up to get him I I suspected he was going to be a very good player and um you know far from a finished product M he does some great stuff and for he's just had his 21st birthday and to play at the consistency that he does in a position on the wing which I think is probably the most difficult position to be consistent in I think that's what's been really good for him James Sicily Scher how worried are you about that if you are at all um well I'm as worried as he is and he's pretty he's pretty courageous um you know he he's playing and he does some unorthodox things I think he called himself a dill I don't think he's looked like a dill at any stage I think he's looked enormously courageous and he he's got a couple of movements that he knows will put him at significant risk with his shoulder he can still tackle he can still get tackled but he knows there's a couple of things that he should try to limit in his game so um he's doing that when it's the right time to do so and I'm amazed at how mature he's been able to do that in the right moment he's been able to pull out of a contest but when he has to go he's done it every time and I'm full credit to him because it's it's pretty courageous what he's doing who's the coach's pet Mitch you know in the footy record every week that's in the and they they fight over it and they get into whoever it is it's been Dylan Moore I think the most I think Josh W's had a few I think um John yukim had a couple will da had a couple so um they're all my favorites I just ask you one question about an issue that is obviously bubbling around in the game at the moment I know Brad Scott said today that he'd like to abolish the the sub Rule and just have five on inter change where do you sit on that um I mean no one likes the as a coach no you never like the sub because you can say to somebody you're the sub this week and they're never particularly happy with that um and then the same conversation mid game are you're being subbed out never particularly happy um with that conversation so I think most coaches would like it abolished and would love to have the flexibility of five so um I probably lean that way um there's a bit of the traditionalist in me that that thinks it's a game where the toughest survive and maybe it should only before but um you know the I don't know if it's worth the worth the amount of hassle that causes at the moment you must be so excited huge finish to this season you've also got the Dingle precinct not far away so the Hawthorne footy Club is uh is in a perfect launching pad well we hope so but I would stress again we're still 11th on the ladder and it's not a I saw your graphic come up before that round eight where this year but across the whole season we've still got plenty of work to do and we know that every every week is a minial for us to keep our season alive well allow us to get excited on your absolutely brilliant to watch well done good luck for the rest of the year thanks guys love chatting to S Mitchell we're off to a break MIT clear when we come back