The Sydney Swans' much-vaunted onball brigade has accepted much of the blame for the loss to Hawthorn on Saturday night.

After having the better of the midfield battle for the first two-and-a-half quarters, the Swans' running players lost control of the contest during the final 45 minutes.

"We weren't working hard enough at a lot of centre clearances, especially at the start of the last quarter," speedster Ben McGlynn told AFL.com.au. 

"They were dominant in that area, so we need to address that during the week as a midfield group. 

"They're a great outfit and they hurt us when we made mistakes, so we're pretty disappointed tonight. 

"We just needed to be able to curb the influence they were having in that patch, and try and stem the bleeding a bit. 

"But we were disappointed with our output through that time. We'll take responsibility and we need to bounce back." 

The Swans went into the match knowing a win would put them two games clear of the Hawks on the ladder. 

Instead, the gap between the first-placed Swans and second-placed Hawks is now just 0.8 per cent. 

"You don't go into the game thinking about that," McGlynn said. "You just want to win, then the ladder will take care of itself. 

"There were just a few basic things that we didn't get right. Against quality opposition, you're going to get hurt if you don't have those things in place." 

McGlynn had plenty of reasons to be happy with his own performance 

He finished with 23 disposals, nine tackles and three goals, including one that needed a score review after Hawthorn defender Josh Gibson claimed to have touched it.

Nevertheless, McGlynn is a man who likes to keep his talk to the fortunes of the team.

He said the Swans would "definitely" use the loss as motivation in the lead-up to the finals. 

"We've got a big battle next week against Essendon at the SCG," he said. 

"So the boys will be looking forward to bouncing back and getting back on the winners' list."