MELBOURNE'S woeful ball use has been a familiar tale of its year and coach Simon Goodwin has lamented the way his side delivered the football in its loss to St Kilda, declaring it is "stressing" the Demons' game.
Despite hitting the lead during the final term on Saturday night at Marvel Stadium, the Dees were outplayed for much of the contest, reflected by the lopsided inside-50 count (39-60).
Goodwin acknowledged turnovers were plaguing last season's preliminary finalists.
"That was a huge concern. We're stressing ourselves a lot with how we're using the ball," Goodwin said.
"Our decision-making, our fundamentals, are really stressing our game. It's been a constant theme for us for a lot of the season.
"Our inability to hit targets and just execute the basics is really stressing us and is causing us concern. You get a score of 13 goals to three on turnovers, there's a reason behind that."
It was a sentiment echoed by star ruckman Max Gawn, who spoke to Channel Seven after the 19-point defeat.
"We're a long way off a really good basic football team that gets the basics right," Gawn said.
"Our fundamentals are deplorable at times."
For Goodwin, the way to fix the problem is by training.
"Keep working hard, keep designing drills that increase our ability to score from turnover, which will hopefully also help us defend in the right manner," Goodwin said.
The Demons are in 17th spot and have the second-lowest percentage in the competition. It's an astonishing fall from a side predicted to be in premiership contention after its young group of core players looked on the brink of something special in 2018.
Injuries have decimated those ambitions in Goodwin's eyes.
"Cohesion's a big thing in footy, your ability to work together over a long period of time, and we've had none of that at either end of the ground for the majority of the year," Goodwin said.
"We want to play better, but we certainly have a firm self-belief that once we get things going, and get our full group back, and get some really good work into them, we're going to be a really strong footy club again.
"That's unwavering, but right now as we sit today, we're just not at the level with the way we want to play, and we haven't got the cohesion within our playing group right now to execute the fundamentals the way we want them.
"We've got some work to do, there's no doubt about that. We've got plenty of work to do."
Melbourne hopes to have key defender Steven May back for next Saturday's clash with powerhouse Richmond at the MCG. His presence would be crucial against Tom Lynch, who is running red-hot, and triple Coleman medallist Jack Riewoldt.
"We're really hopeful. We'll have to assess him and get him through training first, but we certainly won't take a risk with him either," Goodwin said.
"It's a really, really minor hamstring. He's done a bit of work in the backend of this week and over the weekend. We'll just see how he goes.
"We won't take any risk but the signs are positive."
