NORTH Melbourne coach Dean Laidley blamed his players' execution for their loss to the previously winless Richmond by 36 points on Saturday night.
While Laidley was keen to praise the Kangaroos' "intent and attack on the football", he said their implementation of skills "was not acceptable at AFL level".
"I thought our physical intensity was pretty good, but our ability to execute was poor from a mental perspective, taking wrong options, guys out free, two versus ones and we kick it to the one Richmond guy in the middle," he said. While Laidley was keen to praise the Kangaroos' "intent and attack on the football", he said their implementation of skills "was not acceptable at AFL level".
"We practice and practice and practice that and we just couldn't get it right.
"We gave ourselves enough opportunities; we went inside 50 nearly 50 times again, but we're just not putting scoreboard pressure on.
"In the third quarter, they kicked 3.5 and seven of those shots were directly from our kicking turnovers.
"Now, if you're putting scoreboard pressure on your opposition, you're putting them to the sword, but if you keep working your backside off and you turn the ball over and it goes the other way, it becomes pretty deflating."
With captain Brent Harvey and defender Lachie Hansen joining the Kangaroos' mounting injury list, Laidley believes he may have to persevere with out of form players such as Lindsay Thomas until he has a bigger group to select from.
"Lindsay's not going through the best patch so we'll have to have a look at that, but the reality is, [Daniel] Wells is still weeks away, [Matt] Campbell is at least a week away, [Robbie] Tarrant, [Matt] Riggio and [Jesse] Smith are all still injured," he said.
"We're going to have to find a few name tags to get 22 fit players to put on the park next week.
"We're going to have to find some more players, so it's going to be great that guys playing in the VFL [on Sunday] are going to get an opportunity, and we'll look to play them."
Laidley praised the performance of Aaron Edwards, who returned from an in-house suspension for his first senior game of the year, and that of Levi Greenwood, who played in his debut match.
"I thought Aaron was great. Probably just through that AFL intensity his touch saw him drop three marks inside 50, but I thought at times he looked at times our most dangerous forward," he said.
"[Levi] adapted pretty well. He got some cramp in the end, played about 70 per cent game time, and he was one that kicked the ball okay.
"Again, we were pleased with his attack on the football and it's great to get another first-gamer for the footy club.
"He's the 950th player, so it's a number that he'll probably cherish for the rest of his life."
