MIDFIELDER Dom Tyson says playing catch-up football took its toll on Melbourne, after it fell to North Melbourne by 35 points at the MCG on Sunday.

Although the Demons started slowly, they got right back into the contest and entered the final stanza as a genuine chance. But when North Melbourne turned it on again with seven goals to three in the final term, the Roos won their fifth match in a row.

“We knew they were a high-scoring team and to give them that start that we did was disappointing,” Tyson told Dee TV.

“We fought back to be thereabouts, but it was hard playing catch-up footy, so we were really disappointed with that first quarter.

“We didn’t execute the things we’d spoke about it and we just allowed them to run it through the middle and hit-up some easy forwards. They put on the goals and it was just hard.

“The second quarter we fought back and in the third [term] it was an arm wrestle, and it was disappointing to fold like that in the fourth quarter. They had their tails up and they put it beyond reach pretty early [in the final term], so it was disappointing.”

Tyson said the Demons fought back hard from their 34-point quarter-time deficit to get within two points on three separate occasions in the third term, before it fell away in the final quarter.

“We always speak about being in the game at three quarter-time and we definitely thought we were in it,” he said.

“It was disappointing – that last goal on the three quarter-time siren [by North Melbourne’s Ben Brown]. But we thought we’d get inside and beat them at the contest and use our spread and run and it should work out for us.

“But they outplayed us in the last quarter and had a six-goal win, so it was pretty disappointing.”

Tyson, who had a team-high 24 disposals, said the team had its work cut out against a strong North Melbourne.

“We spoke about the midfielders as a collective, trying to get it done on a few key players,” he said.

“We identified they had a few good inside mids, so it was going to be a team role.

“The boys knocked off [Andrew] Swallow, but the outside players like [Shaun] Higgins and [Nick] Dal Santo [hurt us] in patches, so we’ll have a look at it as a group and then assess it from there.”