Essendon coach Brad Scott admits his midfield was given a "wake-up call" by Port Adelaide's high-powered engine room as he counts the cost of a worsening injury list.
Archie Perkins became the latest Bomber to go down with a soft-tissue injury when he hurt a hamstring during the 69-point shellacking from the Power at Adelaide Oval on Friday night.
The blow came as Essendon were taught a lesson by Port's star pair Connor Rozee and Jason Horne-Francis, who spearheaded a crushing 19-6 tally in centre-bounce clearances.
The Power's dominance in that crucial area came despite the Bombers winning hit-outs (34-23) and set the tone in a one-sided affair.
"In the end it's a good wake-up call for our guys," Scott said after his side's 17.9 (111) to 6.6 (42) defeat.
"We're only four games into the season but it's been a strength for us.
"Sometimes, it's just a bit of a perfect storm. Whatever we changed made it worse.
"Rozee and Horne-Francis were just totally dominant in that part of the game and around the ground."
Scott said the key now is how Essendon (2-2) respond ahead of a round-five clash with the Western Bulldogs at Marvel Stadium.
"Part of the message is Port right now are where we want to be and they gave us a good lesson tonight," Scott said.
"You can be clearly very frustrated and disappointed but you've got to learn your lesson and progress from there.
"There's parts of our games that have been a strength in our first three games and it clearly wasn't tonight."
Perkins appears set to miss multiple weeks, joining former best-and-fairest winner Jordan Ridley (quad), Matt Guelfi (calf) and Zach Reid (hamstring) on the list of players sidelined by soft-tissue injuries.
Scott confirmed Ridley has had another setback and won't be available next week as planned, while Guelfi is not recovering as quickly as expected.
Star midfielder Darcy Parish also missed the start of the season with a hamstring injury and Scott admits the trend is cause for concern.
"We'll just have to go and be really diligent in assessing what's happening there," he said.
"We run a really thorough medical program but at the moment we're being hurt by some soft-tissue injuries.
"In a full-contact sport there are some unavoidable injuries but you'd like to think the soft-tissue ones are the ones you can do something about.
"We'll need to go to work on that."
