WHILE it remained against his better judgement, Neale Daniher admitted yesterday he would be compelled to try to choke the life from games if his injury and form-depleted team continued to be smashed as it was yesterday by Geelong.

With a forward line left threadbare by injury and the remnants of the team of form, Daniher said the Demons could no longer hope to kick a typical winning score and would be forced into improvisation to manufacture victories.

"We can't go into games now thinking we can kick 16 or 18 goals so we need to have a look at how can we restrict the opposition to a low scoring game and hope to kick enough ourselves. That is probably where we are at as a team," he said after being soundly beaten by 52 points at the MCG.

"In a sense that is probably where we are at with who we have got available and the form of our blokes, we can't afford to play an open, attacking brand of footy at the moment.

"But we did, we tried that today, we came into the game to try and win and take the game to Geelong, but at the end of the day that didn't work for us. They are a fully fit, in-form team and right now we are probably the opposite."

Daniher added: "We wanted to give it a go. We didn't come here and raise the white flag straight away — I think that it is foolish with your players to say 'We have got no chance and we are not even going to try'. That is not my way and it is not the way I want this team to be coached.

"We go out (to win) and then we respond and I had to respond the way I did at half-time to bottle it up just to somehow frustrate Geelong who were on a fly — they had 11 goals at half time and looked like they could have kicked 22, 23 plus.

"We try to win every game. We will respond the same way depending on how our players adjust and perform on the day, but we will continue to try and win."

Daniher said his team could not match the superior skill level of Geelong, but had been comforted that once he tried to shut the game down the Demons lost the second half by only four points. He rated out-of-form key players Aaron Davey and Travis Johnstone as slightly improved on last week.

Geelong coach Mark Thompson said excitement at the win was tempered by the knowledge Melbourne had been depleted by injuries to David Neitz, Russell Robertson, Brock McLean and Clint Bartram.

"The only fear was we were playing a pretty determined opposition. We knew they would come out pretty hard (and) they did," Thompson said.

"We would have liked to have played the way we did last week and go as fast as we can but unfortunately they had numbers back so we had to change it up and I thought we adapted to it pretty well.

"The only disappointing thing was that we probably should have kicked some of those easy shots in the last quarter — one goal nine is not the sort of way you want to finish a game."

Cats fans were again thrilled by the efforts of teenage forward Tom Hawkins, who booted four goals in the first half yesterday, including three goals in a 10-minute burst during the second quarter.

Geelong's forward riches meant the team barely missed Nathan Ablett, who pulled out five minutes before the game after injuring his hamstring in the warm-up.

The Cats began the match with three players on the bench, while emergency Joel Selwood scrambled to get ready, having only minutes earlier been sitting in the grandstand eating a Mars Bar.