They might be united now in their bid to lead Hawthorn to its first premiership since 1991 but Hawks' coach Alastair Clarkson and former skipper Shane Crawford were not always the best of buddies.

With Crawford on the verge of becoming just the sixth Hawthorn player in the club's history to play 300 games this weekend - when the Hawks take on Brisbane in Launceston - the 1999 Brownlow Medalist and the Hawks' tough-talking coach discussed for the first time on Tuesday their unusual player/coach relationship.

And while there is no doubt the pair could not be closer these days, both admitted there was some difficulties in the early days when Clarkson took over as coach in 2005.

"I thought it was a disaster," Crawford admittedly candidly on Tuesday when asked his thoughts on Clarkson being appointed coach in 2005.

But Crawford admitted he based his opinion on Clarkson on their regular on-field clashes during Clarkson's days as a tough tagger with North Melbourne and Melbourne in the mid 1990's.

"I didn't really know Clarko that well and I had played on him several times and to stop me running he used to punch on with me so it was a love hate relationship," he said.

Clarkson admitted he had used some roughhouse treatment to stop the 1999 Brownlow Medalist during their days as on-field opponents.

"I had to chase him around Waverley a couple of times and I remember one day Crawf took off in the back pocket and he got to the forward picket and I was still in the centre," he said.

"He (Crawford) is an extraordinary athlete and my only way of trying to defeat him was to belt him and we had a couple of good tussles."

Crawford was still captain when Clarkson was appointed coach at the end of 2004 and the new coach certainly did not endear himself to the Hawks' number one player straight away.

"When Clarko was appointed coach and he went through his plan for the football club and the future I knew it was going to be tough for a few years and at the time Clarko moved on a lot of my close mates, who were a bit older, and I thought that is not a great way to start a relationship."

Then Clarkson took the even bigger step of replacing Crawford as captain with Richard Vandenberg but from those difficult early days, the pair has become close with both full of praise for the impact each has had on the club over the past four years as the Hawks have gone from near wooden spooner in 2004 to premiership contender in 2008.

"It's like anything you just embrace the new people that come in and get behind them 100 percent and I honestly don't think anyone could have done a better job that what he (Clarkson) has done," Crawford said.

Clarkson was equally complimentary to Crawford for the way he was able to adapt to the changing environment from 2005 onwards.

"You are enemies when you are foes and playing against one another but when you are bought together when you wear the same colours, you usually find your values are very similar," Clarkson said of Crawford.

"And the good thing about Crawf is he realised where the footy club was at as well and we needed to make some tough decisions