Melbourne coach Simon Goodwin was palpable after his men gave up a 46-point three-quarter time lead to St Kilda on Sunday at Marvel Stadium.
The Demons gave up nine goals in the final term, including a second 6-6-6 infringement after Nasiah Wanganeen-Milera drew the scores level with 10 seconds remaining.
The free kick gifted Saints ruckman Rowan Marshall the ball in the centre circle, whose heads-up play with Wanganeen-Milera caught Melbourne slacking, which ultimately cost them the game.
"It's a pretty simple process to get 6-6-6 done; you need to communicate, get organised, and we didn't get that done," Goodwin said.
"We had seven forwards and we had two wingers, so, as I said, it's a pretty simple process to get right."
It is yet another one of many clashes Melbourne has seemingly failed to claim the victory, albeit in winning positions for large amounts of the contest.
Since the 2021 premiership triumph, Goodwin and his men have been on a steady decline, dealing with multiple off-field incidents as well as a dramatic drop in performance.
All of which yielded an external review last year, and Sunday's performance has now put the Demons coach's future in the spotlight after sliding to 13th position after 19 games.
"It's a part of becoming a ruthless team I'm talking about (when addressing players). You know, there's leadership, there's ability to communicate in a way that gets people organised under pressure, and clearly at the moment, we were under a fair bit of pressure, we'd lost momentum in the game," Goodwin said.
"We had goals getting kicked against us, we need to stay calm, get organised and execute what we need to get executed under the greatest head.
"And, clearly, when you've had seven or eight goals kicked against you in a row, you need to find a way to execute those things under pressure. And we didn't do that well.
"So, we'll learn from it, clearly, and grow from it. But it's unacceptable at the same time."
Captain Max Gawn explained what happened in those final moments.
"I'm probably the only one on the field who knows that we got a warning in the second quarter; they tell the ruckman," Gawn said on Triple M's Mick in the Morning.
"We were about to step in the circle, and I realised we had about two seconds to find a winger; there wasn't a winger on the other side. From there, I didn't nail it. In the end, it's three seconds, so I don't have much time, but I sent (Jack Viney) to the wing and tried to get a forward in – but it was a back that we had too many of. After that free kick happened, we didn't nail it as well."
Gawn revealed the Melbourne players spent 10 minutes after the loss discussing the "mechanism of the last play" before Goodwin joined them.
"There's been five times this year where we haven't known how to win; Giants in the first game we lost by a kick-out, Collingwood we lost by a ruckman trying to kick a torp across goal, and then last week against Carlton we stuffed up. Right now, we don't know how to win in those close games, which comes down to resilience and ruthlessness."
