JACK Gunston says the Hawks still have the belief they can challenge for a fourth-straight premiership in 2016.

Speaking to the media before training at Waverley Park this morning, Gunston said the confidence within the playing group was as strong as ever.

“We know what we’re capable of. We’ve played some good footy in patches this year and other times we haven’t – obviously you’d like to win the games going into finals but we’d rather play those games (like Friday night) now rather than in the finals,” he said.

“We’re still in a good spot – we’re still in the top four and that’s where we want to be.”

Gunston said while there were some frustrating elements to last Friday night’s loss to West Coast, there were some positives to take from the game.

“There was obviously some disappointing aspects to the game and I guess it started right from the start when we just couldn’t get our hands on the ball and when we did we fumbled, slipped over and made simple errors which we’ve only ever done a few times over the last few seasons,” he said.

“It was disappointing to go over there and put in a performance like that and not be able to get the result, but we fought it out to the end – it could have been much worse and there were definitely some positives we took out of it.”

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Ruckman Jonathon Ceglar has been ruled out for the rest of the season with an ACL injury, which is a blow for Hawthorn given his ability to play forward and kick goals.

“It’s unfortunate. He’s been a great player for us and finally taking that number one ruck role it’s disappointing to see him go down,” Gunston said.

“In saying that, in the past few years we’ve lost important players and we’ve been able to fill those roles and the coaching staff adapt around that.”

Hawthorn are building their reinforcements in the VFL, with Ryan Schoenmakers or Jack Fitzpatrick looming as a logical replacement for Ceglar.

Gunston says the Hawks have a number of options at their disposal going forward.

“There’s a lot of guys playing good football in the VFL at the moment – it’s going to get the coaches thinking of ways around (Ceglar’s injury) but we’ve got full confidence we have the depth and ability to cover that role,” he said.

“I’m never surprised with what Clarko might come up with from one week to the next, so there’s definitely a lot of options and a lot of different ways you can go so we’ll have to wait and see.”