While it has long been a cliche of competitive sport that if you don't improve you're going backwards, it's rare in this competition for a champion team to be improving in a way that is visibly apparent. Brisbane probably achieved it in 2002, although the field wasn't strong that year. And unlike Hawthorn of late, theirs was a case of natural progression: some of the young Lions were still developing as players. I'd argue the only other team of the past 40 years to manifestly improve after winning a premiership was Essendon in 1985. Having swamped Hawthorn in the last quarter of the '84 season, the relatively young Bombers collectively walked taller when the next season came around. That year's flag was a lay down misere from April to September. In the case of the current Hawks, improvement is being achieved by a group that should be going backwards. Six important players among them are aged 31 or older. These are men whose bodies were meant to be less capable of absorbing physical punishment than was once the case. Their minds were supposed to have become weakened by regular quaffing of victory champagne. Their focus was expected to be distracted by the fact that there are other things in life. Their lifestyle as heroes within their community was likely to turn the heads of at least some.

But not this bunch. Coming off consecutive premierships, the Hawks are fiercer, stronger, and better than they were. The so-called unsociable football of a few years back has been taken to another level. The supposed truism about learning more in defeat than victory is being turned on its head. It's as if Hawthorn learnt a particular lesson from last grand final day when they bullied Sydney into early submission. The slightly old-fashioned physical dimension of the game has been given a new interpretation. Coaches and fans have always wanted their teams to be harder at the ball than the opposition. Football matches have long been won and lost in that area alone. The concept, though, of a physical onslaught enabling one team to dominate another was becoming less familiar in the tactical modern game.

Perhaps this was professionalism at play, with all teams playing committed football most of the time. Perhaps it was also an outcome of restraint imposed by video scrutiny. Whatever, Clarkson's Hawthorn has reinvented physical domination. Almost necessarily, it has led to occasional - some would say more than occasional - excess. Old hands Luke Hodge, Jordan Lewis, and Sam Mitchell have been at the forefront and each has paid a temporary price. It's the price a team pays for sharpening its winning edge, and a price Hawthorn appears to have paid willingly. Lest this be interpreted as suggesting the Hawks are going too far, it's not. They are walking the line in a calculated, generally controlled way. Teams have been known to go too far in the past: Hawthorn's application of Dermott Brereton as a human wrecking ball in the 1980s was an example.

But the modern-day Hawks are applying vigour and intimidation generally in keeping with the combative game football is. They are throwing down the gauntlet, inviting opponents to take up the challenge. Meanwhile, they go on playing their uniquely brilliant form of the modern game. Carlton assistant coach Dean Laidley spoke before the match on Friday night of their ability to use the whole ground. There is a geometric precision to their method that no current rival is even close to achieving. Their oft-praised kicking gives them speed, their many left-footers appear to give them more angles. Clarkson spoke pre-season of the specificity of his club's recruiting. Not every player who comes to Hawthorn is a perfect kick, but the Hawks only recruit players whose kicking is rectifiable. It shows. Week in, week out these players are putting on a clinic.

Age shows no sign of wearying them. On the evidence of the past few weeks they are setting the bar higher than ever for the pursuing pack. A third flag looks well within reach. If that is achieved, the no-hoper club that had just joined the VFL when Jock McHale's Collingwood won four in a row might be ready for a crack at football's greatest record.