Hawthorn will have to reassess its pay structure if it wants to entice Tom Lynch

HAWTHORN has baulked at offering any player more than $1 million and it’s why the club has been successful, but the Hawks may have to reassess if they want to entice Tom Lynch, writes JAY CLARK.

THE conversation was said to have lasted about 30 seconds.

By then, Hawthorn heavyweights had already agreed with Dustin Martin’s management that the Hawks were unable to meet his salary requirements when the superstar midfielder and top-dollar free agent was on the market last year.

Up until then, all Hawthorn player pay cheques had to start with a “six”.

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Like Geelong, that’s how business had been done at Waverley and, to a large extent, it’s why the Hawks have been so successful.

They have spread the wealth and the thing premiership mastermind Alastair Clarkson despises most at football clubs, and indeed throughout the wider community, is greed.

When the league informally asked Clarkson what was the secret to the Hawks’ golden premiership era after the 2015 triumph, the premiership coach suggested Hawthorn did not have one player in the top 30 highest paid players in the league.

Gill McLachlan went through his books and verified Clarkson’s call. The coach was right. There was phenomenal balance and financial sacrifice throughout the playing ranks.

Gold Coast forward Tom Lynch could command a seven-figure salary from 2019. Picture: Getty Images

But, in what would be a slight, but still important shift, Hawthorn is in a mood to reassess its pay scale principles in 2018.

Why? Gold Coast goalkicker Tom Lynch is weighing up a move home to Victoria and he could yet line up in brown and gold in 2019.

The Hawks are back in premiership contention after snagging Jaeger O’Meara and Tom Mitchell and the rise of James Sicily and Ryan Burton.

But with Jarryd Roughead coming towards the end of his much-admired career, there is a clear need to secure a strong-bodied, contested-marking beast to help lead the club for another eight years.

O’Meara, Mitchell and Lynch will become the league’s newest big three.

But a $700,000-per-season limit probably won’t get him, and the Hawks are considering rejigging things after a 20 per cent increase to the salary cap.

The Hawks were not even willing to pay Lance Franklin more than $1 million to keep him. Picture: Phil Hillyard

Clubs know they have to put up something in the vicinity of seven figures, not that money will be the big driver for Lynch.

He’s financially set-up already under managers Paul Connors and Robbie D’Orazio.

But if he leaves the Suns, it will probably be a near-million dollar offer which nabs him.

So the Hawks will have to up the ante and it was clear at the start of the year Hawthorn was going to consider bumping up its old salary parameters to cater for the changing marketplace.

What they were considering was a more fluid approach rather than rigid limits as they look to catapult back into the top-four after one season out of the final eight.

The Hawks baulked at a $1 million offer to keep Lance Franklin, who went north to Sydney, but they remain in the hunt for Lynch, albeit perhaps for not quite as much.

Clarkson is always moving, always innovating.

Change, he says, is necessary.

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