WESTERN Bulldogs midfielder Farren Ray says the club's 61-point loss to Geelong is "unacceptable", with shades of the "old Bulldogs" plaguing his side.

While coach Rodney Eade was philosophical after the match, saying the result was not a true indication of the Dogs' ability, Ray said the players were extremely disappointed with their showing and are already desperate to make amends.

"We've got to show more character than that," he told westernbulldogs.com.au after the game.

"It was just our second loss for the season, but we wanted to win that game and if we'd lost, we should have only lost by a couple of goals.

"That was not acceptable at the end there.

"Everyone is definitely down. I think that was a bit of the old Bulldogs showing through.

"The Cats are a quality side, and you can't take anything away from them.

"But that was the old Bulldogs and now we just have to look forward."

The 22-year-old said accepting losses like that on the road to the finals should not be a matter of course, and did not provide the side with necessary lessons to make it a serious September contender.

"You look to take some positives out of a loss, but we're going to get judged now in the media because that was such a big game," he said.

"We want to go into finals winning as many games as we can. We want to secure that top four spot, and we're very disappointed with that.

"But I suppose last year, if we lost a game, our tackle pressure was shocking and our run and efforts were too.

"Forgetting the last quarter today, the games this year we've lost we've still had a lot of that [pressure], so that's a positive."

He said the Dogs' plan going into the match was to equal the Cats for pace and to "play on at all costs".

He conceded his side did well to stick to that in the first half, but said more is required to challenge the premiers across four quarters.

"Our tackle pressure and run was not too bad, and we went in at three-quarter time only 14 points down," he said.

"I guess you can't win a game on just tackle pressure and run. Against Geelong, you've got to have everything.

"We wanted to take them on and play a similar style to what they do, and we back our pace and skills usually.

"But, they're a quality side and you can't take anything away from them.

"It was our worst loss for the season and we'll bounce back and get on the training track on Monday and hopefully be back to normal."