MELBOURNE coach Paul Roos has credited his side's heroic three-point win over Adelaide on the club's incredible defensive development.
Under Roos, the Demons have reduced their 'scores against' after seven games by 404 points, compared to the same time last season.
That's just under 10 goals a game.
On Saturday night the Demons were able to hold the Crows, who entered round seven as the third highest scoring team in the League, to their lowest total of the season – 67 points.
Roos said the development of the club's defensive game meant it would be able to withstand changes in momentum and control games more effectively.
"It's been exceptional, to come from where the team was last year, to be able to defend like we do now compared to last year is a dramatic change," Roos said.
"To become a much better defensive team means you can win games like this, when they become tough and hard and other teams are coming at you.
"It's been really important for us."
The turnaround of the Demons from easy-beats to a consistently competitive outfit remains a work in progress but Roos said such stirring victories were crucial.
So measured is the turnaround, that Roos claimed Saturday night's win was achieved by coaching at just 80 per cent of the capacity he ultimately hoped to.
As players' confidence rose, Roos said the side's ball movement would improve
"You're really only coaching at probably 80 per cent of what we want to try to do because it takes time to get things sorted out," he said.
"But you have to get a couple of wins along the way, obviously that keeps the players' momentum going, it keeps them excited and it keeps them doing things we want them to do.
"It takes time to get structures so we're not putting a lot of time into opposition, we're not putting a lot of time necessarily into our ball movement.
"I think we saw today, our ball movement was a lot better than last week and probably better than the week before so I think that'll come naturally."
