North Melbourne’s inability to finish off their AFL opponents will be ruthlessly exploited if Gold Coast coach Guy McKenna gets his way on Saturday.

The Kangaroos have held the lead at quarter-time in all but one of their 10 matches in 2013, but head to Metricon Stadium with just four wins to show for their efforts.

Even in one of those victories North Melbourne did their best to throw away the premiership points, nearly squandering a six-goal quarter-time advantage against Port Adelaide before holding on for a 10-point win.

And Suns coach McKenna pulled no punches when delivering his thoughts on his opponent’s main weakness.

“That’s our great opportunity, we start hard with them, match them and I think the doubts will start to creep in,” he told reporters.

“They’ve shown their inability to sustain games.”

McKenna said the Kangaroos failure to maintain their intensity was again in evidence in last weekend’s match against St Kilda – a game North won by 68 points.

“52 points up at quarter-time and to win by only 60, I don’t know what goes on, I can’t answer that … but I think they’re vulnerable after quarter-time, let’s be honest,” he said.

After impressive efforts against Hawthorn and Geelong in their past two fixtures, where the Suns pushed both premiership heavyweights for significant periods before fading late, McKenna felt his team was well positioned to return to the winner’s circle.

He said those displays had only increased the belief that the Suns are ready to start thinking about future success.

“Dion Prestia’s come out and said `we don’t fear the opposition’ and I can paint them the picture … but until you get those results, and winning results, will they start to believe in that,” he said.

“It gives them some confidence to know that if you play a lesser side (than Geelong or Hawthorn) and are able to compete for longer it might give us a chance of actually winning.”