The AFL has hit back at Hawthorn's criticism of Sunday's clash of colours and blamed the Hawks for contributing to the problem.

Hawks coach Alastair Clarkson on Sunday slammed as "absolutely ludicrous" the decision for umpires to wear lime green when officiating a game between Hawthorn, who wear gold and brown, and Richmond's yellow and black.

"There's no rocket scientists in there obviously," Clarkson said after his side's three-point win.

But AFL football operations general manager Adrian Anderson on Monday questioned whether there was a clash, and said that if so, the Hawks had not helped the situation by wearing their home strip in an away game.

Anderson said the AFL had informed all clubs umpires would wear lime green in round eight, but that Hawthorn had insisted they wanted to wear their home strip instead of their predominantly white away strip.

"We thought there was a better distinction with them wearing the away strip but they said their home jumper carries great significance for games at the MCG," Anderson said.

"So we're surprised by Alastair's comments and we don't agree with them."

Clarkson and Richmond coach Damien Hardwick both said after the game they felt the umpires' colours blended too closely with the teams' guernseys.

Hawthorn forward Jarryd Roughead said on Monday he had not noticed a clash "but a few boys were a little bit worried, so that's something the AFL will have to deal with, not us".

But Anderson said he had watched the game and not detected a clash, and that umpires in previous Hawthorn-Richmond games had worn lime green without the issue being raised.

The umpires wore lime green in support of junior officiators as part of the AFL's program to encourage greater respect from the public for umpires in community leagues.

The controversy over colours was the second in as many rounds, as the AFL recently apologised to Melbourne for umpires wearing pink in the round-seven game with the Western Bulldogs.

In that game Melbourne swapped the red in their guernsey for pink to raise awareness about breast cancer, but the umpires did the same, which caused confusion as Demons players mistook officials for teammates during their four-point loss.

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