The unwanted first for Hawkins as he approaches Cats games record

Next Friday, Tom Hawkins will equal Joel Selwood’s record for the most games played for Geelong.

The coming week will be one of reflection. There will be reminiscing of past glories, and with this a stark reminder that the Hawkins of today is not quite the Hawkins of yesteryear.

Hawkins is not exactly sprinting to the milestone. For the first time in his 354-game career, he has gone four matches in a row without a goal, this time comprehensively beaten by Steven May as the Cats tasted defeat for the first time this year, to Melbourne.

Tom Hawkins of the Cats looks dejected after losing to Melbourne.

As his coach Chris Scott reminded, goals are not the primary measure of Hawkins’ output, even if that will form a key part of how history will assess him. Few have given away more.

Scott is a fierce defender of his players. He would not concede outright his man is in a slump but acknowledged he is slightly off his game.

There are mitigating factors. In the past three weeks, he has played in a torrential downpour in Brisbane, then come up against two of the best defenders in the league in Jacob Weitering and Steven May.

In this low-scoring game, Hawkins was rarely sighted, though produced a moment of class late when he squared the ball to Jeremy Cameron, who could not convert.

In a match where defence reigned, the odds were stacked against Hawkins, who was denied space by May and room to lead into by the Demons’ well-organised defensive set-up.

Often, he was caught well behind May, who was close to the best afield with 13 marks among his 25 possessions.

Rhys Stanley of the Cats and Max Gawn of the Demons.

“To measure his influence on our team by goals alone, I think it’s a sexy stat,” Scott said. “The last couple of weeks, we played well enough without Hawk dominating on the scoreboard.

“What would we have in a perfect world? I think in a perfect world, we’d have four, five or six guys down there that are real threats. Over the years, over the decade or two, we’ve maybe been too conscious of Hawkins and he’s a victim of what he’s done in the past.”

This is not to death ride Hawkins, one of the finest to put on the hoops, or to put heat on his spot in the Cats side. There is not a coach in the league who would dare put his number two defender on Hawkins, who makes life easier for Ollie Henry and affords his coach the luxury of playing Jeremy Cameron up the ground.

Scott acknowledged at his post-game press conference that Hawkins, 35, is not moving as freely as he once had. Already rested once this year, Hawkins will likely be managed again through the season, Scott said.

“You can sort of dig in a little bit deeper – but I think you’re on the right track in terms of backing your intuition,” Scott said when pressed on whether Hawkins was getting to as many contests.

“It’s more than the numbers, but my suggestion would be you’ve watched him at the peak of his powers, and now the observation is he’s not quite what he was.

“But when he kicked a couple of bags of four earlier in the year, he looked more like himself, to me. Maybe a little bit off, but it’s not a physical thing. But we’ve been clear we’ll manage him throughout the year.”

The Demons, despite their obvious limitations in front of goal, are the real deal.

They are far from the complete team but in such an even competition they may not need to be to lift the cup.

This felt like a significant win for the 23 in red blue on the field. It was definitely a big tick for coach Simon Goodwin’s planning.

This was very much a Melbourne game, where every possession is hard fought, ground difficult to take, and goals at a premium, though 14 consecutive behinds would not have been in either coach’s planning.

Just a week earlier, Goodwin had seen how the Cats dismantled Carlton on the rebound despite being well beaten at clearance, also one of Melbourne’s strengths.

Goodwin planned for an arm wrestle. He got one – and won.

By entering their forward 50 with a more deliberate approach, they gave up some scoring potency but, arguably, took away more from the Cat, who were denied the chance to counterattack at speed through a yet to be assembled defensive structure.

From 50 entries, the Cats managed just nine goals. Last week, they scored double that from fewer forays forward. Ten goals proved a winning score.

“You come in with an idea of how the opposition play, you tinker your own game plan to take away a couple of their strengths without losing your identity as a footy team,” Jack Viney said.

“We felt like we were well-prepared coming into this game, and it panned out how we prepared.”