SHATTERED North Melbourne ruckman Todd Goldstein has lamented his club's sluggish start to the season after the Roos had their premiership dreams crushed in a preliminary final for the second straight season.
After finishing sixth last season, the Kangaroos made a stuttering start to 2015, losing seven of their first 13 games.
The club would go on to win seven straight matches and claim eighth spot for September.
Match report: Eagles overcome slow start to storm past Roos
North won two finals, against Richmond and the Sydney Swans, but fell short against the Eagles at Domain Stadium on Saturday evening, going down by 25 points.
Goldstein said the players had been proud of their strong finish to the season, but admitted the club had done things the hard way.
"We needed to start the season better than we did. We need to try and get in the top four and give ourselves more of an opportunity than we did," he said.
"It's a hard slog winning 10 of our last 12 or something like that. You need a lot of things to go right to do that. We need to make it easier for ourselves."
Goldstein had a tough duel with his Eagles counterpart, Nic Naitanui, whom he had shaded to gain All Australian honours during the week.
The Kangaroos big man finished with 41 hit-outs and 12 disposals up against Naitanui and Callum Sinclair but it was not enough to drag his team over the line.
"I think it was a really good effort to make the prelim from the start of the season we had," Goldstein said.
"I think we can take a lot of solace out of that but we realise we have to get better. We are still one step away from where we want to be and that's being a premiership team.
"We have got to feel the hurt, we have got to accept what happened tonight and we have got to move on and get better."
The Kangaroos were smashed by the Swans last season in their preliminary final and despite being more competitive on Saturday night, the result was a bitter pill to swallow.
"It's just shattering. Obviously it was a lot better game than we played last year at the same point," Goldstein said.
"To start really well like we needed to and like we wanted to and then to, but West Coast were just too good in the end."
He said the players could take plenty out of their 2015 campaign.
"We have to realise we deserve to be here, " Goldstein said.
"Our brand of footy stacks up but we just need to make sure we stick at it and back ourselves in and get better. That's all we can do."
