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Collingwood coach Nathan Buckley concedes the Magpies have some work to do after West Coast worked harder to score a 22-point win at the MCG.
Much as it pains Nathan Buckley to say it, Collingwood's players were simply unable to step up to the challenge thrown down by West Coast in their 22-point loss in the resumption of hostilities between last year's grand finalists.
As they did in last year's premiership decider, the Pies started well but the clinical Eagles took the lead in the second quarter and weren't headed in a 15.8 (98) to 11.10 (76) victory on Saturday night in front of 60,878 fans.
It was the fourth loss in a row for Buckley's side against West Coast and he admitted they need to address some fundamental problems they have with the Eagles.
"It's been pretty consistent the way that they've beaten us - we get off to a good start, they grind their way back in and then grind us out," Buckley said.
"We were out-grunted after quarter-time.
"It's been a bit of a consistent theme so it's something that we haven't been able to remedy.
"Our game looked good, again, early but when the work rate went up and we needed to match that we weren't able to.
"... It's not easy to acknowledge that because it's fairly fundamental to the game of footy.
"But I've got no doubts about our capacity to be able to respond to that."
Brodie Grundy was outstanding for the Pies with 40 hit-outs and 22 disposals and Dayne Beams and Taylor Adams each had 26 possessions to be amongst the better players.
Jordan De Goey booted two early goals to help the Pies to an 11-point lead at quarter-time, but Buckley's men found it difficult to manufacture enough effective forward thrusts.
"We only went inside 42 times, which is relatively low, but they only went in 50," Buckley said.
"We scored relatively well as a percentage of our entries, but we left some really clear scoring opportunities on the table.
"I don't think the forward connection stuff was a big ticket item tonight."