Adelaide coach Neil Craig has made it crystal clear - one good quarter in four is nowhere near good enough.

Saturday night's 12.12 (84) to 11.9 (75) loss to North Melbourne at Etihad Stadium might read as an honourable defeat on the scoreboard for a team with one win from eight amid a wretched season.

But for the first three quarters the Crows were dire and trailed by 54 points at the last change, although they avoided a thrashing by kicking seven goals to North's none in the final quarter.

Craig said the final margin flattered his side, and that when it came to reviewing the game, most of the focus would be on the first three terms.

"I think with that sort of performance we've got to make sure it's crystal clear, and not sugar-coat it," he said.

"What I take out of the last quarter is a response from our group not just to play out the last quarter but to be as aggressive as they possibly could.

"But we won't be shying away from the first three quarters."

Adelaide could barely get the ball into attack in the first half, but Craig was most disappointed with the level of competitive effort his players showed in contrast to the Kangaroos.

He was unsure why the Crows were so poor at winning the hard ball in quarters one, two and three yet dominated in the last, but described the performance as a major step backwards.

"It angers the group, the whole football department, because that's not how we want to play our footy," he said.

"We've got to work through that with the playing group."

The defeat left Adelaide with a 1-7 win-loss record, which gives them almost no chance of reaching a sixth successive finals series.

Craig said the Crows were so far off playing the sort of football that gets sides into finals contention that it was not worth mentioning.

"I haven't even thought about finals footy, we're so far away from it," he said.

"You wouldn't even raise it."

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