In a revealing interview on Wednesday, Riewoldt declared that Richmond's poor performances this year may have come about as a result of them trying to copy Hawthorn's game plan.
"Unfortunately, we went one way with our game, and the game went the other way really," Riewoldt told the Herald-Sun.
"We probably tried to copy Hawthorn a little bit too much with our kicking style.
"We probably need to rely a little bit more on natural progression, which I think we’ll get back to, actually I know we’ll get back to.
"You try new things and unfortunately you learn from your mistakes. We’ve learned from it as a playing group, as a coaching group and as a football club as a whole."
The comments were the last thing Hardwick needed as his side – top-four candidates last season – remain in the bottom three after losing to Melbourne last weekend.
And, the coach declared in no uncertain terms how annoyed he is with Riewoldt.
"We've caught up with him this morning, we removed his foot from his mouth and my foot from his arse," the coach said on Fox Sports.
"By his own admission he'd say, listen he buggered that one up. So we'll work our way through it and move on.
"We talk about being a united footy club and Jack went outside those boundaries.
"At the end of the day we are what we are, we're a family, we work hard we make sure we stay within these fur walls and you know we get our game up and going.
"The disappointing thing for Jack is that he went outside those boundaries and unfortunately has a harsh lesson by that."
Hardwick's comments have divided social media in to Team Jack and Team Dimma:
Riewoldt criticises Richmond & Hardwick's playing style. I reckon they'd be a few at Tigerland wishing he still had his media ban in place.
— Sam Edmund (@SammyHeraldSun) May 21, 2014 Can't recall the last time a senior player openly questioned team's game plan. Hardwick response good, although doubt they'll drop him
— Tom Browne (@TomBrowne7) May 22, 2014 Pains me to say this, but Hardwick's wrong, Riewoldt's right. Long copied Hawthorn's gameplan (and/or Malthouse's). Not good enough for it
— Andrew Porter (@andrew_porter) May 22, 2014 Disappointed in Hardwick’s comments this morning re Jack. This was his chance to diffuse the situation and turn it into a non-story.
— Cam Rose (@camtherose) May 22, 2014 Big deal if jack said our game plan wasn't working. It's not like his revealing and secrets there! Stop blaming others hardwick.
— puntrdend (@puntrdend17) May 22, 2014 Hardwick's obviously really feeling the pump. However dropping Jack would be beyond ridiculously stupid. #gotiges
— Kirsty McConnell (@KirstyMac12) May 22, 2014 Can fully understand Damien Hardwick being filthy with Jack Riewoldt... Unfortunately Jack is paying the price for daring to be honest.
— tony jones (@TJch9) May 22, 2014