North Melbourne coach Brad Scott says their early finals exit in 2012 taught him a lesson about resting players and he vowed never to make that mistake again.

The Kangaroos announced on Thursday they intend to rest up to 10 players from their final round clash with Richmond on Friday night.

They have clearance from the AFL for this move.

Scott said the Kangaroos didn’t rest any players in their last round clash with the Giants in 2012 and then travelled to play West Coast and were badly beaten.

“It was a massive blue in hindsight,” Scott said.

“I played players who had niggles, played players who were fatigued and then we travelled to West Coast the next week and got absolutely obliterated.

“I swore to myself then if we were in the same position again I wouldn’t make the same mistake.”

He said the Kangaroos would do everything possible to beat Richmond, but he needed to do the best thing for the club and players ahead of the finals.

He said they had players battling injuries each week to play.

Scott said they also had players in the VFL who deserved a chance to push for a place in their team for their finals campaign.

“We’ll go out with a team without a single debutant and two-thirds of our team will have played over 50 games so I don’t think anyone should be under any illusions as to our intentions tomorrow night,” Scott said.

“We’re going out to win the game.”

Ruckman Todd Goldstein, skipper Andrew Swallow and Jarrod Waite were among those missing from training.