TRUE BLUEY... AFL with Guy McKenna | Courtesy of the Gold Coast Bulletin

THERE is no doubt in my mind our first quarter against Box Hill on Saturday was of AFL standard.

Despite the fact we eventually suffered a heavy defeat, that first quarter was as good as I have seen us play.

The way we moved and hit our targets, I wouldn't expect us to do much better than that as a club.

I said that to assistant coach Ken Hinkley, who is fresher out of the AFL system than I am, and he agreed.

To jump a team like Box Hill was exciting and while I am not prepared to say we are ahead of schedule, I am impressed with where the boys are at.

What led to our downfall from that point was the fact we became too cute or, as I call it, `showtime'.

We really pushed the envelope, which meant we coughed up the ball and made a number of turnovers.

We hurt ourselves unnecessarily and it all comes down to composure and our ability to use our voice.

That is really what we will work on between now and the season's end.

The disappointing aspect against Box Hill was we pushed it to a point and then we went over the top and needed players to pull that back.

That comes down to experience.

If you look through the group now, we have lost our best and fairest in defender Michael Coad to injury. He is 26 with 80 games of senior football at Sturt in the SANFL.

So we look at 27-year-old Daniel Harris as far as experience goes and our skipper Marc Lock, who is just 20.

Then we have Sam Iles and Danny Stanley, who are 23.

That's three players with real senior football playing experience and one out injured, which makes life difficult.

We asked ourselves at the start of the season what was going to be our greatest challenge for the year.

It was always going to be having that composure as well as our lack of experienced bodies.

An experienced body can handle the physical punishment but also absorb that mental punishment when an opposition side gets a run on.

Having just three on-ground coaches makes it difficult. Down at Geelong, they have about 15 on-field coaches who they have acquired over seven years.

We have a bunch of kids who we have had for 18 months at the most.

But this year is about developing, so there is no need to think about trying to salvage something from our season.

We want to keep exposing these boys to top-level competition.

This week we face a greater test away against leaders North Ballarat.

We know it will be tough but we will give ourselves a chance if we have a team of competitors who are prepared to play hard and follow the plan.