It wasn't always easy to watch and there's still plenty for Collingwood to work on, but Nathan Buckley was a satisfied coach after the Magpies squared the ledger against arch-rival Carlton on Saturday night.

The Pies outlasted the Blues in a low-scoring affair with few highlights and plenty of errors, coming out on top by two goals and earning the redemption Buckley hoped for after a shock 15-point loss to the Blues in round seven.

"(You're) always (satisfied) when you beat a side like Carlton, especially with the fact they got the points early in the year," Buckley said post-match.

"We're happy with the four points and we put them in the back pocket and there's plenty of areas to improve on for next week."

The Pies' defeat to the Blues in round seven played a part in derailing their season and although Collingwood hasn't recovered enough to be in finals contention, Buckley felt his side was building momentum coming off a strong win over Fremantle last round.

"Winning hides some ills and losing can hide some growth," he said.

"There's been growth for us probably since round eight going up to Brisbane, after the loss to Carlton in round seven, even though we put in a couple of poor performances against Port and Melbourne before the bye we feel like we've been playing more consistent football.

"We're still a long way from where we want to be, but you can't do any better than getting the wins when you get the opportunities, so we've got a big challenge going up to GWS next week."

If the Pies are to be any hope of challenging the plucky and free-scoring Giants on their home fortress at Spotless Stadium, then Buckley's men will need to significantly sharpen up their ball use going into attack.

Time and time again both sides butchered the ball on Saturday night, with the Magpies' eight goals enough to secure their sixth win.

Returning young gun Darcy Moore (one goal) was clearly the most dangerous Collingwood forward, although Travis Cloke justified his spot in the side pushing up to the wings and taking nine marks, although he only returned 0.2 on the scoreboard.

"It was good to see Darcy come back in, Coxy's (Mason Cox) been doing his job pretty well – he was a bit quiet tonight – and I thought Clokey's follow-up from last week was pretty strong," Buckley said.

"We just need to make more from our opportunities when we go forward.

"Kicking eight goals, you'd like to do better than that, and we just butchered some opportunities coming forward, in particular through our attacking (side of midfield).

"We would've had very few that would've been absolutely satisfied with the way they played, but we were able to grind it out and that's the real positive."

Buckley praised his staunch defence for limiting the Blues to just six goals despite Carlton winning the inside 50 count 44-41, with Ben Reid and Ben Sinclair rock-solid and providing plenty of rebound.

Developing ruckman Brodie Grundy (17 disposals, two goals) also impressed, bouncing back to have the better of Matthew Kreuzer after having his colours lowered in round seven.

"He's just tipped over 50 games a couple of weeks ago, and in the same game against Kreuzer earlier in the year he was outpointed aerially and in the ruck as well," Buckley said.

"Kreuzer took a couple of contested marks in the first quarter and it was looking much the same as round seven.

"But I thought Brodie was able to stand up and was really strong in that facet of his game.

"We know he's a ball hunter and when the ball hits ground level he's an extra midfielder for us, the way he plays, but his ruck craft is developing.

"We think he's starting to understand himself and the game that he's playing a little bit more and he's in a good vein of form at the moment."