DEFENDER Drew Petrie admitted that he thought the Roos had blown their chance to record a sixth straight victory when they fell behind a rampant Melbourne late in the last quarter of their match on Sunday.

While he never completely gave up hope, Petrie said that he thought he'd be returning to the MCG rooms for the second time this year ruing another one that got away.

"I was certainly trying to stay positive but when they got in front at the 30-minute mark, with all their momentum, I thought we were in a bit of trouble," Petrie told kangaroos.com.au after the game.

"The mind did cast back briefly to that Collingwood game at the ‘G in round one, so when Andrew Swallow kicked the winning goal it was a pretty good feeling."

While Petrie was happy to heap praise on Swallow for his match-winning effort, he confided that he wasn't entirely confident that his young teammate had it in him to generate such a telling goal from 50 metres out.

"I wouldn't have put my house on it, put it that way," he laughed. "He played sensationally for us all day, but I think even he would admit that kicking goals on the run from 50 probably isn't his speciality."

As far as his own game goes, Petrie said it was good to get back to centre half-back after spending the past few weeks pinch-hitting up forward in the absence of David Hale.

"I feel pretty comfortable back there,” he said. “I was pretty buggered in that second quarter because Brad Miller leads pretty hard at the footy. They use him a fair bit.

"But I think it's good for me to get back there; I think you tend to work a little bit harder in the backline because you know if you stuff up it might cost the side a goal."

Despite the fact the Roos have won their past six games, Petrie said he thought there was a lot of room for improvement. The Kangas have opened up healthy leads in each of their past five games, only to see a late lapse almost cost them the game.

Petrie said this recent trend had more to do with the team not taking its chances in front of goal than it had to do with any shortfalls in fitness.

"I think our kicking at goal has been pretty bad over the past couple of weeks. In footy these days four or five goals is not a game-ending lead. You need to get about eight goals up to really kill off a side and we haven't been able to do that over the past two or three years so it's a part of the game we really need to improve on.

"We really should have had the game iced at three-quarter time. To kick 1.6 or whatever we kicked in the third quarter … if we had have kicked 5.2, we would have killed them off."

The Roos next face the toughest test in football – the Eagles at Subiaco. Petrie is relishing the thought.

"We've got nothing to lose so we'll take them on at 100 miles an hour. They are obviously a gun side so hopefully the tribunal will do us a favour and run Juddy out for us, but it's really just an exciting opportunity to see how far we really have come since last year. I can't wait."