Although Bailey conceded his team turned over the ball too often in the first quarter, he was mostly pleased with the style they showed.
"We were still trying to make things happen, which you've got to do that against the top clubs – you just have to do it and if you don't do it, then you just set yourself up for playing a really slow type of game," he said post-match.
"So at least the boys had a crack in the first quarter, but I thought the next three quarters, at least we hung in there and we played some more competitive footy."
Bailey said the last two minutes of the match were disappointing, with the Cats kicking a couple of goals, but he said his young players "showed a few signs, which I think is important and we're going to keep putting them in positions and keep challenging them, like we did with Nathan Jones on Gary Ablett. Nathan was really keen for the opportunity," he said.
"Cale Morton went forward and kicked a couple of goals. We really need to generate more goalkickers and obviously Cale did that today.
"Liam Jurrah showed again today he's a pretty exciting player and he doesn't need to get a lot of possessions to make a real impact in the game, and [Matthew] Bate kicked three."
Bailey was also impressed with Stefan Martin's efforts in the ruck: "We're trying to get some ruck work into him, and he just needs to take a few marks up forward to really compliment his contribution to the game."
Bailey suggested veteran forward Russell Robertson started the second half on the bench for failing to adhere to team rules.
"We just thought a couple of efforts that he put in weren't quite up to the standard, so we had the opportunity to let players know that one of the ways [to address it] is to start on the bench," he said.
"I thought Russell tried pretty hard. As a senior player you probably get judged harder than a young Bennell or a young Jetta or Petterd … when you become a senior player, you've got to meet certain expectations."
Bailey said half-back/winger Paul Wheatley was a late withdrawal because of a thigh injury.
"In the last training session, he got a nick in his thigh and with five minutes to go, he just felt a small strain in his thigh. It's not a major one, but we'll reassess it this week," he said.
