Heavily criticised after a disappointing performance against Gold Coast the previous week, the Demons showed commitment to the contest against the Tigers, but were eventually outclassed.
Although not accepting of a loss, Neeld commended his players' effort.
"I can coach now, if that's what we're going to bring to the table," he said post-match.
"We can work our way through it.
"We know there are some turnovers that we made that we need to continue to work on, and stop making as we progress."
Neeld pointed out that last week's game had not been reflective of the previous month.
"We realise that, with our inexperience, we're going to go up and down in that area (competitiveness)," the Melbourne coach said.
"We're trying to alleviate that.
"We feel that since the GWS game, we've had one week where people could question our effort, across a five-week period, so that's not too bad."
Neeld's future at the club has come under continual scrutiny this season, and was in focus again on Saturday when club great Garry Lyon said the man he helped appoint should come under "heavy review".
Neeld said he had not heard Lyon's comments, but accepted that such scrutiny was par for the course in the life of an AFL coach.
He reinforced his belief that his inexperienced group was heading in the right direction.
"That's the life of being involved with the AFL," Neeld said.
"But we're very, very clear of what our role is and where we're going, and how we're going to get there.
"We believe we're assembling a player list.
"We had a massive turnover last November, and six months into that, eight games, we've unearthed quite a few kids who are going to be around for a while.
"We just need to add those couple of boys who are out at the moment to them and things will be all right."
Defending his coach, recruit Chris Dawes said effort was player driven and that Sunday's level had to become the regular standard.
"Coaches shouldn’t have to coach effort at AFL level, that's on the players," Dawes said.
"That won't happen again, that sort of lack of effort that we saw last week.
"Tonight was the first step towards that."
The Demons laid more tackles than Richmond (67-65) and won only seven fewer contested possessions, but were dominated on the 'spread'.
The Tigers had 96 more uncontested possessions, with eight Richmond players collecting more disposals than Melbourne's top ball-winner Nathan Jones.
Neeld said improvement in that area could only come with time, pointing to second-year Tiger Brandon Ellis, who gathered 39 disposals, as an example of what his young players were working towards.
"Those guys [who have played] under 10 games, they're getting around the 20 disposals," Neeld said.
"By the time they've played another year or whatever it is to feel a bit more comfortable at the level, they're the guys that will need to get that extra 10 to 12 disposals."
In the meantime, he said, the Demons would continue to focus on contested ball and defensive pressure.
Already weakened by an injury list that includes co-captain Jack Grimes and key forward Mitch Clark, Melbourne suffered another blow, with first round draft pick Jimmy Toumpas rolling his ankle in the second quarter.
Neeld said the injury was "not severe", but was likely to sideline the South Australian for a "couple of weeks".
He said he hoped to regain Jack Watts for next week's clash with Fremantle in Perth.
