croady_fan24
Club Legend
HAWTHORN skipper Richie Vandenberg believes his side’s tough run into September will help them deal with the pressure-cooker situation that awaits them at Telstra Dome this weekend.
The Hawks meet a finals-hardened Adelaide Crows outfit on Saturday afternoon, and the loser of the elimination final can start planning their Mad Monday celebrations.
But Vandenberg is confident his men are equipped to deal with the finals intensity that will confront them at Telstra Dome, even if many of them will be playing their first finals.
“We’ve been playing mini-finals for the past five or six weeks as far as we’re concerned,” he said.
“So we think that the young guys have been somewhat prepared, albeit for the fact that most of them haven’t played in a finals game before.
“All in all, it’s mostly just going to be a great experience and the pressure that comes with it is something that these guys certainly won’t be able to predict what it’s going to do to them, but I’ve got good confidence that the group will be able to handle it.”
The Hawks captain acknowledged his team seemed to have gone from flag fancy to elimination final underdog in the space of a few days.
But he said he and his teammates were confident in their ability and knew they had what it took to match it with the competition’s elite.
“We’ve been under no illusions all year as to where as a group we feel we’re at,” he said.
“We went into last week confident we could beat Sydney but unfortunately for us we were unable to do that.
“But as a group we’ve shown over the course of the year that if we get our heads right we can bounce back very quickly the next week.
“The challenge for us now is to see what we can learn out of that game (against Sydney) and what we’re able to do about it over the course of the six days we’ve got to make sure we go out and approach Adelaide and put up a good performance.”
Saturday will mark the Hawks’ return to finals football after a six-year absence.
During that time there have been some low moments for the club, but Vandenberg said he had always remained hopeful that a quick turnaround was just around the corner.
“As a player, even when you’re in the years where you think ‘Gee, your back’s really up against it’, you still have in the back of your mind that hope that at any stage you could make it,” he said.
“All players at all clubs have that, and you need to have that hope to motivate you.
“It doesn’t surprise me at all with the group that we’ve got, and their approach to their footy over the past three years … It doesn’t surprise me at all that we’ve got this opportunity now.
The Hawks meet a finals-hardened Adelaide Crows outfit on Saturday afternoon, and the loser of the elimination final can start planning their Mad Monday celebrations.
But Vandenberg is confident his men are equipped to deal with the finals intensity that will confront them at Telstra Dome, even if many of them will be playing their first finals.
“We’ve been playing mini-finals for the past five or six weeks as far as we’re concerned,” he said.
“So we think that the young guys have been somewhat prepared, albeit for the fact that most of them haven’t played in a finals game before.
“All in all, it’s mostly just going to be a great experience and the pressure that comes with it is something that these guys certainly won’t be able to predict what it’s going to do to them, but I’ve got good confidence that the group will be able to handle it.”
The Hawks captain acknowledged his team seemed to have gone from flag fancy to elimination final underdog in the space of a few days.
But he said he and his teammates were confident in their ability and knew they had what it took to match it with the competition’s elite.
“We’ve been under no illusions all year as to where as a group we feel we’re at,” he said.
“We went into last week confident we could beat Sydney but unfortunately for us we were unable to do that.
“But as a group we’ve shown over the course of the year that if we get our heads right we can bounce back very quickly the next week.
“The challenge for us now is to see what we can learn out of that game (against Sydney) and what we’re able to do about it over the course of the six days we’ve got to make sure we go out and approach Adelaide and put up a good performance.”
Saturday will mark the Hawks’ return to finals football after a six-year absence.
During that time there have been some low moments for the club, but Vandenberg said he had always remained hopeful that a quick turnaround was just around the corner.
“As a player, even when you’re in the years where you think ‘Gee, your back’s really up against it’, you still have in the back of your mind that hope that at any stage you could make it,” he said.
“All players at all clubs have that, and you need to have that hope to motivate you.
“It doesn’t surprise me at all with the group that we’ve got, and their approach to their footy over the past three years … It doesn’t surprise me at all that we’ve got this opportunity now.
