North Melbourne coach Brad Scott has urged his players to be more proactive as the Kangaroos look to rid themselves of the inconsistency that has dogged them over the past two months.

The Kangaroos have put together back-to-back AFL wins just once over the past eight matches and Scott conceded they had taken a step backwards in last week’s loss to fellow top-eight contender Adelaide.

North square off against resurgent Melbourne at the MCG on Sunday and Scott won’t be dwelling on the negatives as he looks to shore up his club’s position inside the eight.

“This week we’ve reinforced some of the things that we do well,” Scott said on Thursday.

“We’re going to try and get back to that sort of footy and talk about some of the things that we do rather than just focus on the negatives.

“Like most sides we play our best when we’re really making the play and I thought we were very reactive in combination with Adelaide being very proactive, which is a pretty bad equation when you’re trying to get on the front foot.

“No doubt it frustrates a lot of our players who are consistent to have us labelled as being inconsistent.

“But that’s not a label, that’s just a fact.”

The Demons are flying high after their thrilling one-point win against Essendon last week with Scott impressed with their turnaround under Paul Roos.

“Their midfield has been significantly bolstered from last year and that’s paying dividends,” he said.

“I think they’re playing really good, honest, fundamental footy.

“We’ll have to be really smart with our ball use going forward they’ve got a lot of really good defenders, but we’re scoring pretty well from our inside 50s as well, so it’s going to be a real battle on that front.”

North Melbourne will be without Daniel Wells for at least another three weeks after his foot injury was found to be worse than initially thought.

Scott agreed the diagnosis was a blow, but said speculation the midfielder’s season was in doubt was wide of the mark.

“If everything goes perfectly from here we expect him to play in the next three weeks, but then we’ve got to consider that his last game was in round five,” he said.

“Being medically cleared to play and being conditioned to play AFL footy are two different things.”