HE IS regarded in football circles as one of the best coaching strategists in the game, but Hawthorn Coach Alastair Clarkson remains humble and determined in his pursuit for the ultimate success.

He has tasted premiership glory with the Hawks once – in 2008 when it so famously defeated Geelong and denied the Cats back-to-back flags.

That success, which came sooner than the Hawthorn maestro had predicted was the result of the hard work, sacrifice and determination Clarkson instilled in the Hawthorn players, coaches and staff when he arrived at the Club at the end of 2004.

The Club had just finished in 15^th position and looking for a new direction and leadership under an untried coach who’d spent two seasons as an assistant at Port Adelaide following stints at St Kilda, Werribee in the VFL and Central Districts in the SANFL.

Clarkson hit the ground running in his first season as coach of the Hawks, and despite finishing in 14^th position after making some hard decisions both on and off the field, saw rapid improvement in the seasons following. 

It took him just three years to take Hawthorn to the finals, where it won one final in 2007 and in his fourth season, secured the Club’s illustrious 10^th premiership.

Along the way, Clarkson has faced the trials and tribulations in creating a new direction for Hawthorn, and the comings and goings of players synonymous with the demands and requirements of AFL football.

He understood his role, as the new senior coach of Hawthorn from the minute he stepped foot inside Glenferrie Oval, determined to restore the Hawks as one of the most powerful clubs in the AFL both on the field and off it.

“My role wasn’t to search for what the reasons were and why it happened, it was more about   recognising where the club was at at that point in time and then trying to help it get back on its journey to being a strong and powerful club,” he told hawthornfc.com.au

Part of that role was to understand the professionalism required to make a successful AFL team, and he turned to his knowledge and values passed onto him by his first ever VFL/AFL coach who just happened to be Hawthorn Legend, John Kennedy Snr.

He has instilled in the Hawthorn players, coaches and staff both past and present, the values needed to create a trust within the Club needed to achieve success.

“I’ve tried to leverage off the great family values of which this club is well known,” he said.

“I knew the way that ‘Kanga’ (Kennedy) coached, his approach and philosophies would have been very similar - whether it was at the time he spent coaching this great footy club for a long period of time or when he was coaching me and several other players at North Melbourne.

“My football values were indoctrinated in me by John Kennedy as a player, I spent three years under his guidance and they just happened to be the most impressionable years of my football because they were my first three years of VFL/AFL football.”

He also had to bring in new players, a task made easier given he had selections two and five in the 2005 National Draft and a recruiting team capable of identifying talent.

From 2004 to 2007, Jarryd Roughead, Lance Franklin, Jordan Lewis, Grant Birchall and Cyril Rioli joined the Club, players who would form part of the nucleus of its 2008 premiership and key players needed for sustained success.

“You have to do some tough yards as a coach. We needed to turn over a new leaf and start a new chapter for the Hawthorn footy club,” he said.

“We needed to put a lot of games into our younger players and channel a lot of our energies into drafting really smartly.

“We were able to recruit some really special players into our club who have gone on to be very good players and leaders of our club now.

“Roughead, Lewis, Franklin, Birchall, Rioli and these type of guys came in in the first two or three years and have become the real backbone of our playing side.”

Clarkson joins Kennedy Snr and Club great Allan Jeans as the only three men to have coached Hawthorn for 200 games.

But the Hawthorn boss remains as modest as ever in his coaching and career assessment, but is proud to join the two men he holds in such high regard as the only people to reach the milestone at Hawthorn.

“It is a little bit (surreal) because I’ve got such great regard for both ‘Kanga’ and ‘Yabby’,” Clarkson said.

“It’s been a really exciting journey and we’ve achieved a lot of things along that path but I still feel like there are plenty of things to achieve in the years ahead.

“Kanga (John Kennedy Snr) has been such a great mentor of mine in a sense because he was my first coach when I was at North Melbourne when I was a player.

“Yabby (Allan Jeans) – I was really fortunate enough to spend a lot of time with him prior to his death, which I was really fortunate to be able to do.

“There’s some great Hawthorn people like ‘Parko’ (David Parkin), ‘Knightsy’ (Peter Knight), ‘Schwabby’ (Peter Schwab) who have coached this club that I’ve got an enormous admiration for that haven’t coached 200 games.

“To get that achievement, it’s pretty special.”

He reflects positively on his time in Adelaide, grateful for the experiences he gained and the preparation it provided to enable him to move seamlessly into the role as senior coach.

“That played a significant part of me getting my appointment here, so I’ve got very fond memories of my time in Adelaide and my journey,” he said.

“It was all about trying to get as many different experiences as I possibly could to best prepare me to be a senior coach and then I obviously got the opportunity here at the end of 2004.”