ONE OF the great things about regular season footy is that if you have a bad game, you can make up for it next week.

Redemption is just days away, unless there's a bye.

That was the case for Collingwood, losing to Hawthorn in the lead-up to the Hall of Fame Tribute Match, and Pies midfielder Shane O'Bree admits the break was a frustration.

"It always is, if you've got to wait an extra week just to play a game of football to redeem yourself. It frustrates you a little bit," he said.

"We got over it pretty quick – Hawthorn played pretty well, and we tried to move on as quick as possible, and train as hard as we could on Friday, then have the weekend off to watch the State of Origin (Hall of Fame) game.

"The buzz at training this week has been pretty high, and we trained pretty well [on Tuesday]. After Friday's session – we had a solid session – then we had the weekend off to go back to the community, and we've freshened right up and everyone seems pretty good."

The 29-year-old, who plays his 200th game this week, said the match against the second-placed Hawks was an aberration.

"Our midfield's been pretty good all year, but that's probably one game where we let ourselves down a little bit," he said. "It's something we can learn from, because Hawthorn's playing pretty good football at the moment.

"We've had our review, and sussed out where we went wrong there and we'll work on that."

With the Cats, the Hawks and the Bulldogs clearing out at the top of the ladder, the congestion mid-table is increasing.

Eight teams are separated by just six points with the clash between the Pies [eighth] and the Saints [fifth] to take on eight-point status.

"Where we're sitting at the moment, we'd like to be up a bit higher," O'Bree noted. "But with the ladder being so even, right through to about 12th position, you want to keep winning every week so you don't lose touch with the top four.

"We're not too far off our best, I feel that way. We haven't hit our straps yet, and this week will be a good indicator. We match up pretty well against St Kilda and hopefully we'll have a win."