At a glance:

• Peta Searle says consecutive defeats to flag fancies Carlton and North Melbourne have further highlighted aspects of the Saints' game to work on.
• Efficiency entering forward-50 will be a key focus for St Kilda heading into Round 4.
• Mature-age players Rhi Watt, Kate Shierlaw, Rosie Dillon and Hannah Priest were among the Saints' best against the Blues, while Georgia Patrikios again topped the club's disposal count.

Peta Searle says back-to-back losses against top-tier sides Carlton and North Melbourne won’t readjust St Kilda’s yardstick, but has further emphasised areas for improvement moving forward.

“Honestly, we’ve played a couple of good teams. Where we’re at, you always want to be better – it doesn’t matter where you are,” Searle said.

“I don’t know if (coming up against North Melbourne and Carlton early) gives us a good feel, but it certainly gives us an opportunity to keep working on what we’re doing well and keep going forward with that, but also in the areas in which we need to improve on.

“At the end of the day, most of our players are only six, seven, eight games old.

"When you think of it like that you can put things into perspective, but having said that, we all want to win and we all want to achieve."

Efficiency entering forward-50 will likely be the chief focus in the lead-up to Round 4, with the Saints only yielding six scores from their 20 entries (30 per cent) on Saturday evening. In Round 1 against the Western Bulldogs, that same figure was up at an impressive 70 per cent.

Carlton convincingly won the inside-50s by the final siren (20-34), yet Searle's side found themselves slightly ahead of the count at three-quarter time.

The Saints weren't able to capitalise on that advantage in the third term, however, registering just one major with the north-easterly breeze. Carlton – fighting against a headwind that quarter – slotted two. 

“We had a couple of opportunities where we scored points instead of goals. You always change that around and it looks a little bit different, but no, we didn’t capitalise,” Searle said.

“(We had) enough chances I guess to hurt an opposition, but it was a bit of a combination of the way we were bringing the ball in and I guess the way were structuring up in the forward line.

“G-Train had two on her the whole time, but where was our other forward, why aren’t we lowering our eyes, what else is available? There’s still a bit of work to do in that area obviously.

“The ways aren’t anywhere outside our gameplan, I guess it’s just having the confidence and belief to execute that, and I think it’s just time in the game for our players.”