Adam, an opportunity lost tonight in a couple of different ways, what went wrong?

It was a missed opportunity, Hawthorn played really well. (It was) Probably the fundamentals, in the end, for us really. The critical contests that we lost, they made us pay, but across the board, I suppose, the basics was where we fell down. Not system or strategy, more just opportunities to be clean or convert. Those type of situations we’re normally pretty good at we weren’t tonight and they were really good. The way they (Hawthorn) played, the way they handled the night, the situation and the event was better than us. So we’ve got to tip our hats to Hawthorn.

It did seem that way, that ball movement you are known for wasn’t quite there tonight. Something was a little off with the turnovers, was that their pressure?

I thought the only thing going for us at stages was our ball movement. For the first two and a half quarters, anyway, that’s what we relied on. We just don’t want to do that. So we’re normally better in situations that require a ‘win or halve’ and we just didn’t execute that. So when you’ve got to rely on ball movement from the back half it doesn’t stand up. So we’ve got some work to do but we’re still alive. Trying to find the balance with our players, supporters and members. It was disappointing tonight but we’re alive and we’re going to have a good shake at it.

Are you happy with the mix that you’ve got? I know it’s a work in progress in terms of your backline personnel with Schofield maybe in the mix, shifting things around and bringing Duggan back in. Are you happy with how it looks?

Well not tonight. I need to look at the vision, I need to look at how we go about it, missed opportunities, all those sort of things. We’ll work through that. We’ve got some good availability, so that’s good for us. Our WAFL boys play tomorrow, they’re alive too in their season. So we’ll assess all that in the next 24 hours.

The premiership has been won from outside the top four but if you were to finish fifth, how confident are you that you can go all the way?

How confident? Of course (we’re confident). Probably, if you miss top four, this is the one loss you can half, today. We’ve got to win four in a row I suppose. But I haven’t thought that deeply about it, it’s a missed opportunity tonight, we’re really disappointed, the way we played (tonight) is not going to stand up in the finals, so we’ve got to play better. But we’re coming off a pretty good game last week, albeit we didn’t get the victory, and we’ve been in a pretty good space in the back half of the season. So we need to find a way to draw upon the good stuff, acknowledge and be pretty pragmatic with the bad stuff, and then get on with it.

Such a big occasion last week against Richmond at the ‘G, in hindsight, did that maybe take a bit out of everyone?

I don’t know, I think we’ve been around long enough to handle those big games. I mean we probably had six or seven players who didn’t play late last year and some of those players are young. But that’s not an excuse, we’re better than we did tonight. But we’ve got to acknowledge what Hawthorn did, it wasn’t like we just rolled over, I know it might have looked like that, but the way they played was pretty consistent all game. The way they competed and how clean they were got us in the end.

Did you expect Ben McEvoy down back, I know you’ve worked with Clarko so you know he pulls things out of the hat every now and then, did you expect that to happen?

Well he did that last week, so we planned for that. Where he’s going to start this week you don’t quite know but I think it was more about effort tonight than strategy. So we weren’t surprised with anything they did, they just executed it really well and we didn’t handle it.

It looked like Sheppard copped a pretty heavy knock to his ribs – do you know how he is?

I’m not sure, he’s pretty tough. Like all our players we’ll keep backing them in, we’ve got their backs. And as long as they keep bringing spirit we’ll keep backing them in.

I think it was only eight days ago you were two games clear, and percentage, in the four – now you’re out of it?

I know we’ve spoken about this a fair bit, you keep asking me about it, but I just want to keep winning. Unfortunately we didn’t do that tonight. So where we fall will be where we fall and then we’ll get on with it.

Tom Barrass – he’s had a fantastic season and he’s a fantastic young player but he’s had a couple of tough weeks. With someone like Tom do you pull him aside and say ‘What’s going on?’ or do you not agree with that?

I’m just going to keep backing him in. He hasn’t let me down too often, and our players and our club. You look at all the things he does well, and you’ve got to improve too, you be honest, but he’s a fine young player and I’m going to keep backing him in.

Willie Rioli seems to be improving week on week – what have you made of his progress, his fitness and his midfield time?

Yeah, with Willie we’ve missed a lot of footy this year. He’s pretty much in his second year, like a lot of our players, and he keeps standing up in big moments. I think he likes the big stage, he’s a typical Rioli. We’ve been really happy with his form since he’s come back, his fitness has improved every week and he’s going to be important for us moving forward.

You’ve played a lot in bursts this year, a good quarter here and there but not sustaining it. Can you put your finger on why?

It’s a good question, playing four quarters is difficult for anyone, I think, and eight days ago we were two games clear in the top four, so we’re yearning for that, I think everyone is, a good four-quarter effort. The way the finals are played and what we need to get to is probably not the way we’ve been playing at the moment. But then I reflect on the last few weeks and the back half of the season and we haven’t been too far off. Today we were a lot off, but we’re not going to try and reinvent the wheel in the next 10 days.

You still know your best footy is good enough? First quarter against Richmond and elements tonight – you still know your best footy’s good enough if you can produce it?

Yeah, you look at the way we move the ball, I think we’re traditionally a bit better than the way we move the footy. So our best is as good as anyone’s, if we’re winning our own ball, competing hard and being predictable and the fundamentals are there. That’s the bit we’re yearning for. But we’re not going to try and completely flip things ‘180’. We’ve got some work to do but we’re alive.

One thing that might help flip it is whether you can include Nic Naitanui in the side and whether you keep Tom Hickey in the side and Oscar Allen. How are you going to work that out in the next 10 days?

Well hopefully it’s a good problem to have, I think he trained again today and ticked another box. I think Nic played 17 games for us last year and really helped us set up the front half of the season. To get where we are without him for probably 20 games, for, in particular, our mids, I think in stoppages we had a good win tonight, not that that’s the be all and end all. But he compliments our team, no doubt. So we’ll go through that at match committee and find out whether we can play both, we’ve done it before, but he’s definitely one of our best players, if not our best, so if we get him back that’s good for us.

Does the week off come at a pretty good time for you now?

I don’t know, trying to handle this is something we’ve got to reflect on. What our players need to hear, how we need to improve, we’ll go through all that. We’re pretty honest at the club, we know what we need to improve on. So quite often when you play like you did tonight you want to get back on the horse pretty quick but we can’t do that. So we’ll take our time and we’ll be pretty pragmatic.

What did you learn from 2016? You were in an elimination final, the Dogs were coming in after a week off, you were in a Grand Final the year before. What did you learn from that part that you can use here?

Well in 2017 we won into the finals in the last game and we won an after the siren victory at Port Adelaide. We’ve been up for a while, we’ve been up since probably 2015 and onwards. We’ve had plenty of experience in finals and we’ve won plenty of finals. So we’ll keep drawing on those experiences but I haven’t thought too deeply about 2016, I think we’ve probably evolved a little bit since then.