NORTH Melbourne captain Adam Simpson says the tighter interchange rules will result in less rotations in the long-term.

“It will slow down. Watching the Collingwood game on Friday night, I’m sure they had less interchanges and that would be because of the new rule,” Simpson said.

“I think they are just trying to clean it up a bit. We’ll be confused for a little while but I don’t think it is going to be an issue in the long run.”

Simpson said players and officials had to adjust to the closer scrutiny of interchanges.

“It is difficult if you’re buggered, need a rest and take yourself off. If there is a player in the same position who is ready to go on you don’t need to go to the coach’s box to come off,” he said.

“Now you need to make it a bit more structured by waving to the bench. Sometimes you have to play with 17 men instead of pushing the borderline with 19.

“They’ve gone pretty hard on it but I think you’ll find in a few weeks it will settle down.  They might tweak it a bit at the end of the year but we’ll get a handle on it.

“We’ll adjust. I don’t think we had a problem on the weekend. You’ll probably see there’ll be less rotations.”

Simpson said this week’s game against the undefeated Western Bulldogs would provide the perfect litmus test for his side, which sits sixth on the ladder.

“We’ve probably beaten the teams we were meant to have beaten and fallen short to Adelaide and Hawthorn. The Doggies are in great form and we’ve got a really tough six weeks coming up. We’re playing some top teams and you’ve got to win a few of these,” he said.

“Between third and 14th there’s not much and if you win the close ones you’re in the hunt. If you lose those close ones you do fall away pretty quickly.”