Hawthorn led by as much as 72-points in the second quarter! But Carlton found some of their famous pre-season form to fight out the second half to go down by 34. Despite the loss, the Blues found more of the ball and some high scores...

The Brief...

• Carlton played a posession game and despite the loss helped themselves to 13 more kicks and 46 more handballs!
• Nick Stevens, Kade Simpson, Marc Murphy and Bryce Gibbs piled on the stats
• The Hawks come out of the game with some injuries and reports

The Hawks

Hawthorn were led by strong performances from Tim Clarke (with 99 DT points and 88 SuperCoach points), Jordan Lewis (87,85) and Luke Hodge (79,105).

Young Hawks Travis Tuck (79,83) and Cyril Rioli (53,80) impressed while the hyped up Xavier Ellis (53,34) and Beau Muston (42,39) would have come out a bit disapointed.

The Hawks forward line would also be disapointed with Lance Franklin (38,56), Tim Boyle (37,63) and Mark Williams (25,15) contributing miniimal returns.

Hawthorn also came out of the game with some injury concerns with Chance Bateman coming off with a calf injury in the fourth quarter. Grant Birchall suffered a corked thigh which shouldn't trouble him too much and Mark Williams received a poke in the eye. If that's not enough, the Hawks got reckless late in the game and who else but Campbell Brown prvided them with some tribunal issues, the big Hawk charging Kreuzer in the back in the fourth quarter. Josh P Kennedy was also reported for charging Marc Murphy and this was a head high but not a great deal in it... With several key Hawks out through suspension in the early rounds they can't really afford to miss these guys as well!

The Blues

Carlton appeared to play the posession game that Port played against them last week. We're not sure why they thought that was a good ideam but if it was to score Dream Team and SuperCoach points then mission accomplished! If the Blues persist with this game plan they'll be well represented in fantasy teams this year.

Nick Stevens topped the list piling on 133 Dream Team points and 122 SuperCoach, while Marc Murphy (108,84), Kade Simpson (99,109) Bryce Gibbs (93,97) and Michael Jamison were all impressive.

Not much news down the list - Heath Scotland (63,90) and that man Kreuzer (33,34) were a bit out of the action.

In injury concerns - Shaun Hampson (29,16), who impressed last week against Port, received a knee to the groin which appeared minor and Ryan Jackon (27,25) left with a hip injury in the second quarter.

What's Next?

Hawthorn travel to a NAB Cup semi final against the winner of Adelaide and Fremantle.

Carlton travel to Alice Spring to take on the West Coast Eagles in a challenge match.

DT