Clarkson described the opening NAB rounds as a "nightmare" for coaches and support staff to juggle players through two lightning carnival style 40-minute games played in just two-halves.
He wants a revision to the summer competition and prefers just a straight four-quarter match against just one opposition in the opening week.
The Hawks suffered a horrendous first-up trek to Queensland in NAB Cup opening engagements with surprise losses to Gold Coast by just one point on a free-kick for goal after the final siren and then by 21 points to Brisbane.
The 2008 Hawks premiership coachslammed the two shortened match format.
The league's opening NAB Cup series is six divisions of three teams and played across two weekend, before Rounds 2 and 3 revert to traditional four-quarter matches with more established AFL regular season rules in readiness for the premiership season.
Clarkson even took a swipe at the competition pay television rights holders Fox Footy for conducting extensive interviews with coaches and players during the NAB matches.
“It’s all too higglety-pigglety for mine,” Clarkson said on Thursday.
“We’ve had players training for four months and they’re playing their first game.
“I would just rather it to be more stable and players know what game they’re playing and what game time.
“Not having to worry about using alternative rooms and alternative (coaches) boxes and doing media at all different stages all throughout the game.
“It’s NAB 1 and so we don’t worry about it too much.
“But ideally you’ve got 18 sides and you have nine sides play another side that (first) week.”
Clarkson has called into his NAB clash with the struggling Western Bulldogs on Friday night in Melbourne star on-ballers Sam Mitchell, Brad Sewell and Jordan Lewis.