North Melbourne coach Alastair Clarkson has lamented the Kangaroos' inability to put the game to bed when they were on top in the first half against Fremantle.

"There was enough evidence there that we can play an exciting brand of footy and restrict a pretty good opposition," Clarkson said.

"We saw really strong evidence of that in the first half.

"It was eight goals to three and we had three (set) shots at goal in a two-minute period that might've nearly been enough to really force Fremantle to change."

Meanwhile a controversial decision late in North Melbourne's loss sparked a call from Clarkson for greater use of video review technology.

With the Dockers up by 19 points with eight minutes left to play, Fremantle midfielder Matthew Johnson's pass backwards in defence floated over teammate James Aish and hit the behind post.

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The goal umpire signalled out of bounds on the full, which would have given the Kangaroos a free kick in a scoring position, but was overruled by the nearest field umpire, who deemed Aish had got a hand to the ball.

The boundary umpire was not close enough to make a clear call but was also involved in a three-way discussion between the officials before they decided on a throw-in.

The incident was not reviewed because there was no score - or potential score - involved in the passage of play, and Clarkson felt the uncertainty could have been solved by a video review.

"Any time there's uncertainty by a goal umpire or a field umpire - whether it's out or in or touched or whatever - I would've said any time there's uncertainty on that, let's just use the score review," Clarkson said.

"I'm not sure why they didn't, but anyway, it doesn't really matter. It wasn't the issue in the game.

"We know where we did well in the game and we know where we need to pull our socks up."