HAWTHORN coach Sam Mitchell has addressed concerns about his midfield after it was convincingly beaten in his side's 33-point loss to reigning premier Brisbane at the MCG on Saturday evening.

The Hawks were outclassed in clearances around the ground, finishing the game with 17 fewer than their opponents, despite winning the hitouts with 50 to the Lions' 29.

HAWKS v LIONS Full match coverage and stats

Of particular concern to Mitchell was his side’s performance at centre bounce where Brisbane doubled Hawthorn in clearances.

It’s the second week in a row they’ve been badly beaten in the middle, with the Gold Coast Suns winning clearance by 15 the week before.

“Centre bounce in particular, that's two weeks in a row we've been really torched in there,” Mitchell said following the loss to the Lions.

“We've been pretty good in that area for the last 18 months. So centre bounce is an area where we know we can be potent ourselves if we can win the ball.

“We had some significant issues around that area for now two weeks, so there's a bit of work to do around centre bounce.”

Brisbane’s midfielders in Hugh McCluggage (11 clearances), Will Ashcroft (eight) and Lachie Neale (five) combined for 24 clearances, whilst the top three clearance-winners for Hawthorn - Jai Newcombe (five), James Worpel (four) and Josh Ward (three) - combined for 12.

Of additional concern to the Hawthorn coach was his team’s inability to lay effective tackles, with more than a third of his side finishing the game without a tackle to their name.

“I think we had nine players who didn't lay a tackle today,” Mitchell said.

“I mean, the way they (Brisbane) play is they're very good at taking pressure off themselves. That's a big strength of theirs.”

“So, not being able to get enough pressure onto them. We sort of chatted about that before the game and we scouted it and we suspected that they would play that way. We weren't able to get enough pressure on them at key moments in the game.”

One of the players without a tackle was Hawthorn captain James Sicily, who has been below his best this season.

Sicily’s opponent Callum Ah Chee kicked four goals today, including one from a 50 metre penalty for umpire dissent in the final term.

Mitchell, though conceding the free kick was ill-disciplined, defended his skipper’s performance.

"I thought Sis (Sicily) was really good tonight. He had nine or ten intercept possessions. It looked like he had his marking hands back, so it was good to get him back into a bit of form," Mitchell said.

“Obviously, discipline late in the game, it was an enormously frustrating game, and they need to learn from that and be better. Obviously, the umpires have got a very, very difficult job, and giving away 50s for dissent is far from what we expect of ourselves.”

Brisbane coach Chris Fagan couldn’t be more pleased with the response of his team following the Lions' loss to Melbourne last week.

“Our midfield is a high quality midfield, but we've lowered our colours the last couple of weeks to North Melbourne and to Melbourne,” Fagan said post-match.

“So they're a proud group and they looked to respond. They did. To win clearances by 17. Hawthorn are pretty good at the clearance. And that's how they've gotten us in the past.”

Fagan was rapt with the performance of Dayne Zorko, who finished with a game-high 33 disposals and 996m gained.

"Yeah, he (Zorko) had a terrific game. I think he was a problem for them," he said.

“Nine-hundred and ninety six metres - he’ll be filthy he didn't get a kilometre. He just, as you say, takes so many metres off opposition teams really quickly. And it gives our forwards good looks.”

The Brisbane coach was asked about the health of his number one ruckman Oscar McInerney who missed Saturday evening’s game with soreness.

"He (McInerney) could have played today. We named him as an emergency, mainly cause if Forty (Darcy Fort) did something in the warm-up," Fagan said.

“The week off has helped him. The day off today will help him. We’ll see what we do on Thursday night.”

Brisbane play Essendon on Thursday night at the Gabba, whilst the Hawks will face another tough challenge when they meet Collingwood on Friday night at the MCG.