The Western Bulldogs might be facing a steep challenge to stay in Grand Final contention, but coach Paul Groves remains positive about the "bigger picture stuff" for the team.

When asked about how he would approach the remainder of the season and beyond, Groves remained upbeat.

"I spoke to the girls about [the fact that] this is not just an exhibition series of seven games, it's an ongoing plan, he told media post match following his side’s narrow loss to Collingwood on Saturday night.

“Bailey Hunt, Ellyse Gamble [among others]… these girls can be here for the next ten years. We're about continual improvement, giving them the confidence that, 'you're a Western Bulldogs player now', it's not all getting thrown back in the draft pool.”

Groves said the signs were good on the weekend despite a costly five-minute period late in the third term that turned the match. The Bulldogs had done well to restrict the Magpies to just one goal with the use of the breeze in the first half of the third quarter but a late burst of goals saw Collingwood take a 22-point lead into the last break.

"A five-minute patch in the third quarter where they kicked three, maybe four goals, just like that, we couldn't stem the flow. After that we did. For the rest of the game I felt we probably had control."

The Bulldogs used the wind advantage well early in the final quarter to set up numerous scoring chances but couldn't capitalise on enough of them, eventually falling seven points short. Groves said the Bulldogs had demonstrated the ability to be very potent when they took the game on.

"Once we took the game on again, and we showed that in the last quarter last week [against Melbourne], we're a pretty damaging team. I thought in the last quarter we probably utilised our numbers a bit better, entries inside 50 were a little bit better."

The Bulldogs face Carlton on Saturday morning at Ikon Park.