The fifth-placed Hawks take on Strathfieldsaye at Flight Centre Park on Saturday aiming to defeat a side above them for the first time this season.

Aside from a 69-point loss to Golden Square in round seven, the Hawks have matched it for large parts of their games against top-three sides Sandhurst, Gisborne and Strathfieldsaye in their first meeting, but haven’t won any of them.

“We’ve had enough of getting close to these sides,” Monaghan said on Friday.

“We need to put together four quarters of football and not lapse.

“We’ve been allowing sides to get momentum in games and score quickly and one of our aims is to learn how to combat that, and that needs to come from our on-field leaders.”

The Hawks’ inconsistency within games was shown last round against Kyneton when they built a 47-point lead at half-time, only for the Tigers to slam on 11 goals to one in the third quarter.

However, the Hawks were able to stem the momentum in the last quarter and win by seven points in one of the games of the season.

“We were happy with three of our quarters last game against Kyneton and it was a really gutsy win by the boys,” Monaghan said.

“Now we come up against the Storm who are in awesome form, so we know if we don’t produce anything other than four quarters, the result isn’t going to go our way.”

The Hawks’ side includes Sam Thompson, the son of Hawks’ legend Darren Thompson, making his senior debut.

Among the Storm squad of 24 is Shaun Everington for what would be his first game of the season after an ankle injury.

The Storm and Hawks will play for the Give Me Five For Kids Cup