Senior Coach Brendan McCartney is calling on the Bulldogs playing group to focus on doing the basics consistently after the 62 point loss against Hawthorn on Sunday.

McCartney said the players momentarily lost sight of the team’s core values at times during the round 19 clash, which ultimately allowed Hawthorn to take control late in the game.

“For me it’s what do we want to be as a group of players… and what do we want to be as a team and how do we want to be as a Club,” McCartney said.

“We want to be a club that sometimes when the game is not going [our way] – and often it’s not going the way you want because of the quality of the opposition – [we] just keep doing the little things well.

“We moved away from the little things and the next minute they kick two late goals into the breeze and we knew we were dealing with a four or five goal breeze late in the game.”

The Bulldogs lost the third quarter by a mere five points after both sides produced five scoring shots for the term – but the away side couldn’t match the intensity in the final quarter kicking just one goal to the Hawks five.

McCartney said there were a number of learnings to take from Sunday’s game before the turn their focus to St Kilda next weekend, as they look for a more complete four quarter performance.

“There’s a lot of learning in it,” he said.

“When we sat off too much and didn’t push up and defend we got hurt, when we didn’t take our chances we got hurt and when we probably weren’t as strong over the ball as we could have been we got hurt - but you move forward.”