Carlton midfielder Heath Scotland says the Blues remain confident despite their winless AFL pre-season.

They suffered their fifth loss on Sunday when North Melbourne held them off in the last term to win by 16 points.

Scotland says not too much can be read into pre-season wins and losses, noting Carlton won the 2005 and 2007 NAB Cups.

They finished last in 2005 and second last in ’07.

“Form, you can’t turn on and obviously you can get a bit worried … but we’re not,” Scotland said.

“I’ve been part of two pre-season premierships and we’ve gone on to finish last (sic) in the home-and-away season.

“Our plan was to prepare for the home-and-away season and we think we’ve done that quite well.

“Pre-season games – we didn’t have an agenda to win them all.”

The Blues also have several frontline players unavailable for the round-one clash against Richmond, but Scotland said the club had achieved their goal of managing the list through the pre-season.