Hawthorn General Manager of Football Graham Wright has all but ruled out the club trading players with value in order to improve their draft position.
Greats of the club including Jordan Lewis and Shane Crawford have suggested the Hawks should allow the likes of Luke Breust, Jack Gunston, Chad Wingard and other veterans to move on.
This would bring strong draft capital into the side and allow long serving members of the club to finish their careers contending for finals.
Wright however has put a line through that strategy.
“If you’re talking about those sort of guys Breust, Gunston, Liam Shiels who have been outstanding players for us and have been really good players for us, at the moment we need every good player we can get,” Wright told SEN’s Bob and Andy.
“Obviously we’ve had some injuries over the last six or seven weeks but prior to that we hadn’t, and our year hasn’t been good enough.
“We’re pretty much on notice as a footy club that it has been unacceptable. We’ve all been in the hub environment, there’s a whole heap of excuses you could make around it, but in the end we haven’t been good enough and we need to be better and that’s in all areas of the footy club.
“The last thing we would want to do is take away two or three of our best players and feel like we can get value for them, that’s not what we are about.”
SEN’s Sammy Edmund reported last week that Hawthorn has offered premiership wingman Isaac Smith a contract for 2021, highlighting their desire to keep their veterans.