Jack Dyer looks at Hawthorn
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FROM the Mayblooms to the Bashers. That’s what the critics are saying about Hawthorn. After years of being the underdogs, the chopping block for the other League clubs, the Hawks are hitting back, and their critics don’t like it.
I know the frustration that must have been Hawthorn’s when they were the laughing stock of the League. We treated them as practice. They had individual champions but they were easily overpowered because of the lack of strength in the side, and their champions were repeatedly crashed to the turf and knocked out of the game. Is it any wonder they are answering force with force?
For years it was doubted whether they could survive. I will never forget the shock and horror of the first time they beat Richmond. During the game I was using my old rugby tactic of tucking the ball under my arm and fending players of? with the open palm. Every time I did it the umpire penalized me and I am convinced he did so at the direct orders of the umpire’s coach. They got up and beat us by a point. We couldn’t believe it, it was the ultimate disgrace to be beaten by the Hawks. We could hear Carlton and Collingwood players laughing from miles away.
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The next time they beat us was even worse. Dick [Jim] Bohan, their crack centreman, took us apart and cost us a place in the finals. The shame of it all was they were bottom of the ladder at the time. Bohan kicked six perfect goals from the centre - four of them in the last quarter, and weren’t the Hawks jubilant. It was worth more than a Premiership to them.
When did the change come to Hawthorn and how?
Now they are the most feared combination, particularly physically, in the game. The ghosts of former Hawk players must be chuckling at the squeals of the opposition as they remember the times they were battered into the dirt. I hope the Hawks stay on top.
The change in the Hawks started with Bob McCaskill, a former North player and one of the greatest coaches on record in country districts. He didn’t have a great deal of match success with Hawthorn but he built a tradition for the club in the early fifties. Hawthorn for the first time were going in hard, protecting each other, pulling together as a team and not as a group of timid individuals. He made them brothers and had them thinking for the club instead of themselves.
He didn’t waste time in letting rival clubs know the Hawks had found their wings. Players found if they hit one Hawk they had others to answer to. They had bruises when they left the field and the Hawthorn matches were becoming torrid, strength-sapping aflairs. They were starting to win matches, not enough to make the finals but enough to be snags, danger opponents.
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McCaskill was blending the players into the breed that wins Premierships. His creed was ‘You can carry two squibs but no more, and the squibs have to be real good’. His plan was working like clockwork and there was a Premiership coming up for him when he became ill and had to retire. Had he kept going I'm sure Hawthorn would have won a Premiership much earlier.
All the time there were two men absorbing the McCaskill doctrine, John Kennedy and John Peck. McCaskill was a showman. Jack Hale took over from him but lacked his finesse and even with good sides couldn’t get his players to go on and win often enough to make the finals.
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But then came Kennedy with the ability to carry out the McCaskill plan. He wasn’t a stylist in his own right but he knew what he wanted and how to get it. He was ruthless in his endeavours to get success. But in his ruthlessness and merciless grinding training he never lost the admiration, respect and loyalty of his team. He never shirked the issue and he didn’t expect anybody else to shirk it.
Kennedy was a martinet at training but he topped off McCaskill and built into the club something it had never possessed before—the fire and determination to make the four. He cared for nothing but Hawthorn and that’s how he had his players thinking. It was one in, all in. They went from success to success under Kennedy. They played bruising, ferocious football and their style of winning became the talking point of football.
Was it unfair? No, it was just pressure football. Rival coaches squealed. They forgot the days when they crushed the life out of Hawthorn. Anything went with Hawthorn. Kick them, punch them, do anything as long as you beat them. Now the boot was on the other foot except the Hawks weren't playing it dirty. They tackled hard, hit hard with the shoulder and when they grabbed a player they took him right to the ground.
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Kennedy ignored the jibes, the protests and hatreds of rival clubs and their fans. He has his target and achieved it on the M.C.G. in 1961 when they crushed Melbourne and then Footscray to win their first-ever Premiership. And only a Richmond Premiership has ever given me greater pleasure.
Graham Arthur (right) and John Peck have been vital cogs in the Hawthorn machine, particularly Peck. He has developed into the best wrestling full-forward the game has seen. He wins goals with strength and courage.
The loss of Kennedy will be severely felt, but with Arthur taking over and adopting the same fierce determination to win the Hawks are going to stay on top for a long time. He is the type of man to pass the tradition on to his players, and probably one of them is the future coach of Hawthorn.
Let's hope they never become the Mayblooms again.
Footnotes
An excerpt from Captain Blood: Jack Dyer as told to Brian Hansen. Published in 1965 by Stanley Paul & Co. Ltd.
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