While a barren club history and a near-perfect season give St Kilda all the motivation it needs for today's premiership decider at the MCG, the Cats crave redemption.

For all their excellence over the last three years, the Cats keep going back to the one that got away.

Hawthorn was brilliant this time last year, capitalising on Geelong's poor goalkicking to win the grand final by 26 points.

Cats coach Mark Thompson said yesterday the team would draw more on the loss to the Hawks than the 2007 grand final triumph.

"They're pretty recent momories, so you'd hope that when the players are going through a tough period of the game, that they should be able to find something from the hurt they felt last year," Thompson said.

"It's a very hurtful thing to occur in a person's life and it was quite recent."

This Geelong generation has been superb, breaking the club's 44-year premiership drought with it 2007 success, but one flag from three grand finals would be no dynasty.

Even though the Hawks did not make the top eight, there have been frequent reminders of their exploits.

For more, pick up a copy of today's Canberra Times