The Hawks haven’t wasted any time staking their claim as contenders with three straight wins to start the year, including an impressive, if nerve-wracking, victory at home against the highly-rated Saints on Saturday. 

Continuing a habit of proving to be North Wagga’s nemesis, the Hawks led from the 18^th minute of the first quarter until the final siren sounded with the scoreboard showing 12.5 (77) to 11.9 (75) and the ball in the Saints’ forward 50.

“We tried our best to give it back to them, and they kept coming,” EWK coach Matt Hard said. “It was a good game of footy. I thought we were probably the better side for the majority of the day so I would’ve been disappointed had it not gone our way, that’s for sure… 

“They seemed to have the momentum finishing but we were in front at the right time, so I was pretty happy to hear that siren.”

In a high-quality encounter, the Saints had the best of the early clearances and four of the first five scoring shots.

But Nick Hull’s move from EWK forward to ruckman soon changed that and the home side kicked four goals in six minutes to go to the first break 22 points up. 

Twice in the second quarter, they were out to a 28-point lead. North Wagga were on the back foot. But they weren’t boxed into a corner, let alone on the canvas, moving the ball well at times and managing to be back within three goals at half-time. 

With the better of the early stages in the third quarter, the Saints kicked 3.3 in 12 minutes and were just a point behind, only to see the Hawks wrest back control and bang in three goals in seven minutes for a 20-point lead.

North Wagga’s challenge came as they opened up nicely in the fourth quarter.

But finding targets up forward was difficult against a dogged EWK defence, led by Nick Curran and Trent Garner. 

Saints’ new midfielder Tom Bennetts kicked two goals in the quarter – including the last to put them within two points – while Jarrod Conway was switched forward and came up with one. 

But a desperate EWK goal to Scott Burge early in the quarter proved massive as did a Brenton Roberts tackle in their defensive 50 late. It earned a rare but legitimate free kick in the last quarter just when the consistency of umpiring had started to confuse and frustrate players on both sides.

Assistant coach and star midfielder Chris Gordon was superb for the Hawks and Hull also a headache all over the ground. But Hard was also happy with the performance as a team.

“I thought we started really well and we stuck to the way we want to play our footy,” he said. “I thought our pressure around the contest was pretty good. Obviously they’re a very good side and they set up very well so we knew we had to really have our pressure up and about, which we did.

“I just thought it was a pretty good day for us and different blokes stood up at different times, so that’s promising.”

With a tough start to the season – facing last year’s five other top sides in the first five rounds – Hard said he never put a target on the number of early wins they wanted. He’s happily taking a hat-trick without getting carried away. 

“We just want to be hard to play against, be consistent and we’ve sort of done that,” he said.

“We’re three-and-zip, we’ll take that every day of the week but the tasks get harder as the weeks go on and obviously we have the reigning premiers next week.”