Melbourne captain Max Gawn says the club is focused on addressing the disconnect between their midfielders and forwards.
The Demons had no problems getting the ball inside 50 last season but the delivery to their forwards was often wayward and not to their advantage.
Gawn described Melbourne’s inefficiency forward of centre as “relatively embarrassing” and said the playing group is working closely with new assistant coach Adem Yze to improve their ball movement during the pre-season.
“The main difference that I’m feeling early on in pre-season is we’re going to try and convert the high inside 50 rate that we have,” he told SEN Breakfast.
“We’ve got no issue getting the ball in there and we’ve lost games where we’ve won the inside 50 count – to be fair that’s relatively embarrassing.
“That’s been the main focus so we’re going to try and convert our inside 50s and if we can’t we’re going to try and keep it in our forward half.
“It’s a similar message to what we said last year but I doubt we’ve worked on it as much as we have this year.
“We’ve got Adem Yze that’s come across and he’s brought an aggressive mindset with his ball movement and midfield coaching.”
Melbourne haven’t played finals since their run to the preliminary final in 2018.
Simon Goodwin’s side face the Western Bulldogs in their one and only AAMI Community Series match at Marvel Stadium on March 8.