Instead, the local girls suffered a 1-0 defeat to Adamstown Rosebud that sees them dragged back into a three-way battle to escape the wooden spoon.

A win would have seen them move six points clear of last-placed Thornton, but instead it was a second-half goalmouth scramble that Chelsea Lucas poked home that proved the difference.

While disappointed not to win the match, coach Mick Grass said the season continued to be a learning curve for his young side.

"We've got to be more intense for a whole game and that's been the scenario all season where we have moments in games where we drop our intensity," he said.

"There are other times in games where our intensity is really good and we compete really hard, but then as soon as we drop our guard teams take advantage of that."

That was the case on Sunday as he admitted learning the art of playing with intensity was proving a challenge.

"Like every team in every sport, you try to train the way you want to play so we try to train with as much intensity as we can," he said.

"But having such a young team, it's easy for them to switch off at times."

While Mid North Coast controlled large portions of the game they were unable to find the back of the net.

"The performance was better than what we've been putting on the park the last two or three weeks," Grass said.

"We got back to playing a bit of football and there were large chunks of the game that we controlled and the goal scored against us was a bit of a scrappy one in the box.

"They just came out on top of that bit of a scrappy moment."

The performances of forward Layni Fens and defender Lauren Brown impressed the coach.

"Layni played up front and the intensity and effort that she gave for the whole game was really good and I also thought that Lauren at the back put in a fantastic performance," he said.

Grass said Mid North Coast's tiring schedule that had seen them hit the road for the last five-straight weeks took its toll.

"(Sunday) was an improvement but the two or three weeks before that we have probably dropped off a little bit," he said.

"I felt we were playing better football earlier in the season and there can be a number of reasons for that."

They will now settle into an away-home-away-home pattern for much of the remainder of the season.

"Without that travel fatigue hopefully we can get back into some semblance of quality football," Grass said.

"I've said it from the start of the year and I'll continue to say it until the end of the year ... these girls are still developing as players.

"Yes, there's pressure on them to perform but we can't expect them to be dominating a competition that's full of W-League players and seasoned veterans."

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