Jimmy Bartel says yesterday’s devastating defeat a the Gabba would be a waste of time if the Cats cannot take anything constructive from their five point loss.

All four veterans, Bartel, Stokes, Johnson and Selwood, drove in hard with 31 possessions each. However, it still wasn’t enough to inhibit the Lions in the last quarter.

“I don’t think we’ve played a worst half of footy in a long time,” Bartel told Cats TV.

“We’ve put together a lot of bad first halves this year and we’ve managed to pull it out of the fire, but we just couldn’t stop their momentum when they got on a roll.

“If we don’t learn anything out of it, it will be a complete waste.”

The Cats VFL did more than re-live last year's Grand Final, they owned it by taking the win to 85 points.

The Cats led the way in a number of areas, including disposals, (380, 367), tackles (59,56) and inside 50s (62, 54).

Unfortunately this delivery was not enough for the Cats to stay in the race. Bartel agreed their low clearances played a part in yesterday’s downfall, although he felt it was their overall effort that really let them down.

“Yeah it starts from clearances but then they simply out worked us, and sometimes effort is all you need,” Bartel said.

“They certainly got a roll on, and we were probably a little bit slow to react, a bit off our man, didn’t stick to our tackles and our decision making was pretty slow. There were a number of things.”

Bartel felt the Cats did well in the opening half. He believes they could have carried out the win if they had executed better inside 50.  
“I think we did alright, we defended well and I think we had them by 40 points by three quarter time,” Bartel said.

“It was probably our execution going inside 50, we could have made them pay a lot more and maybe the game would have been beyond doubt.”

Harry Taylor spoke to Cats TV after Geelong's defeat against the Lions

Bartel says the Cats will take the good from the bad in preparation for Saturday night's rivalry clash against Fremantle at home.

“We’ll look for some positives, but I’m sure there will be a lot of boys hurting right now.”

“You lick your wounds for a day or so, take the lessons out of it and then look forward to next week.”