Kuwarma defender Rory Laird says the team will head into the bye frustrated by inconsistency but encouraged in how close it is to matching it with some of the best teams in the competition.

Strong patches of football were undone by lapses at key moments against Hawthorn in Launceston on Thursday night, as Kuwarna fell short by nine points.

Laird opened up on the team’s post-game analysis, and said minor tweaks and improvements would help find that consistency that had been missing for the first part of the season.

“It’s frustrating, it’s been the tale for the first half of the year, there was a little bit of inconsistency throughout the game,” Laird said.

“We played some really good footy, and we played some inconsistent patches of footy. I think as a group, we’re not happy with where we are at, in terms of consistency of performance.

“For periods of time in games we have been (good) against those teams, we’ve lost two or three (games) by six or 10 points, that comes down to consistency as a team, and as individuals.

“In saying that, you can look at it on a positive note as well. If we do really start to click with that then we’re right around the mark in terms of these top teams and how we're matching up against them.”

Kuwarna started the game strongly to take a 12-point lead into the first change, but the Hawks flipped the script, piling on seven unanswered goals, before a final-quarter comeback from the visitors fell short.

Laird said the team put itself under pressure when in attack, and would need to learn how to better manage momentum swings against the competition’s best sides.

“We couldn’t get field position, like field position off stoppage, and some of our entries up-forward were a little bit shallow,” Laird said.

“When a team that is as good as Hawthorn is attacking off shallow entries, they set us up that way.

“That was probably a catalyst for their goal blitz.

“This time around we started off really well, and then we sort of dropped away a little bit, and they were able to kick six or seven goals and then came home strong, and against good teams, we just can’t let them back in the game like that.”

Kuwarna sits with a 6-5 win-loss record ahead of a 14-day break, before facing Geelong at Adelaide Oval on Thursday, June 4.

Laird said players would use the bye as a refresh and to work on ways to improve ahead of the second half of the season.

“It’s a little bit of a mental and physical freshen up, as AFL players, there’s a few days here where we need to make sure we are still switched on,” Laird said.

“Guys who are sore, they need to make sure they are on top of that, we’ll do a little bit of a run and make sure we are all ready to go next week.

“You look at it and we’ve got Geelong on a Thursday in a couple of weeks’ time, so rest the body and rest the mind, but get back into it pretty quickly, too.

“(There’s) plenty of room to improve, but there’s also some greener sides to it as well.”