Sam Mitchell has caught lightning in a bottle. After the years of drift, the racism scandal and the shambolic exits of Alastair Clarkson and Jeff Kennett, Hawthorn are a team to fall in love with again. For neutrals, there is something we dared not say out loud until last Friday: why can’t this team, a team that was still 13th after 19 rounds, win the premiership?
Mitchell and his former coach barely talk to each other any more, but they share certain personality traits and footballing philosophies. “Be rigid in fundamentals and technique, but flexible in scheme,” was something the great American football coaches Bill Belichick and Nick Saban built their success upon. Clarkson was similar. His great Hawthorn teams could play ugly or with Swiss precision. But there was no deviating from his core demands – his players had to be excellent kicks, and they had to be prepared to eschew individualism for the collective.
