Collingwood coach Nathan Buckley opened his weekly media conference with a 'mea culpa'.

"Yes, we should have tagged Gary Ablett," he said at the Westpac Centre on Wednesday. "What else?"

Ablett, the raging Brownlow Medal favourite, torched the Magpies at Metricon Stadium on Saturday night with 49 touches and two goals, to spark Gold Coast's upset seven-point win, which likely put paid to Collingwood's hopes of a top four finish at the end of the home and away season.

"Twelve months ago he had 53 touches against us at the MCG and we won by 100 points. So fast-forward a year and clearly he was an influential player in the result.

Recap Buckley's press conference here.

"He made a big difference and was clearly the stand-out player on the field.

Buckley said Ablett's output against the Magpies hadn’t changed in 12 months, but that the supporting cast around him had.

"They're adding to their squad and their talent pool and they have some other dangerous players, but clearly it was a mistake on my behalf and the coaching panel's behalf not to go with other alternatives, particularly in the second half.

"That has come out clearly in the review."

It was a poor performance from the Pies and Buckley was quick to list to several other poor outcomes from the match, such as three scoring shots from free kicks and 50-metre penalties conceded, as well as other disciplinary and structural issues.

"There are plenty of things we can improve on. There were large parts of the game we were doing what we wanted to do but weren't getting reward for it. Some of our execution was poor."

"But when we dropped off our effort, Gold Coast took full toll and we got the result that we did. We didn’t play well, didn’t take our chances and didn’t put the opposition under enough pressure."

He acknowledged that key forward Travis Cloke, who has kicked 4.9 in the last fortnight, was working as diligently as he could to rectify his goal-kicking yips, but noted he was displaying excellent touch until the past couple of games.

Buckley said the Magpies had to bring their best to every game, which is why he will pick his best available side for Saturday's twilight game against Greater Western Sydney at the MCG. There will be no rotations and no resting, which has been the case with several clubs against the fledgling Giants in the past.

"Anything is possible this year," he said. "We haven't given up on our prospects this season. We have six home and away games left and we want to improve."

He said Dayne Beams, Lachlan Keeffe and Tyson Goldsack had much to offer as they return from extended breaks and that the Ben Reid 'swingman' experiment would continue.