Coach Luke Beveridge is adamant "the worm will turn" on the Western Bulldogs' horror AFL goal kicking as they eye a response against North Melbourne.
The Bulldogs kicked 7.19, including four rushed behinds, in their 38-point loss to Richmond, after booting 9.17 in a win over Sydney, and will be out to improve their accuracy in the Good Friday clash at Marvel Stadium.
"The positives with it all are the opportunities that we're creating and we feel like we haven't drawn the benefits from the way we've defended as a team," Beveridge said.
"We've had some periods where we've just frustrated ourselves enough where unfortunately, we've given really good opposition teams enough of a look for them to get momentum.
"...it's probably the height of our lack of efficiency there since my time at the club.
"The worm will turn and we've just got to have faith that what we're doing will get us there.
"On a short week, you can't spend a lot of time on repetition, a lot of it's about recovery and preparing for the next challenge.
"But we did enough yesterday to get ourselves in the right frame of mind."
Aaron Naughton and Marcus Bontempelli each kicked three behinds against the Tigers, while nine other players also kicked points.
Beveridge noted preventing poor goal kicking from becoming contagious in a game was largely mental, but also required better forward-50 entries.
"For all the inside 50s we're getting, we can turn them into better quality entries and get more of a chance to kick the goal," he said.
"Because our percentages of where we're taking our shots from and the probability that we kick them are reasonably low, but we'll get there.
"One of the things you try not to do is turn it into a gorilla because you're talking about it too much and spending too much time on it."
Beveridge didn't believe 2021 grand finalists needed to reset after their 1-3 start to the season but said they hadn't yet re-established themself as contenders.
"Our challenge is to shave off these loose ends that are costing us in games but understanding we've got our own challenges, whether it's personnel, the teams that we're play are just a little bit more powerful than us at the moment."
Meanwhile key defender Alex Keath has had a setback with his hamstring injury and is set to miss four-to-six weeks.
Zaine Cordy will return from concussion while Beveridge flagged veteran Mitch Wallis could again be used as the medical substitute.
