More improvement left in Pies

Collingwood coach Nathan Buckley says his side are still approaching their best football ahead of their blockbuster clash with Hawthorn at the MCG on Saturday afternoon.

After dropping two of their first three games of the season, the Pies have lost just one of their last 12, seeing them into third spot on the AFL ladder, behind Sydney and Adelaide on percentage.

With seven home-and-away games remaining, Hawthorn are slight favourites to take out the premiership, with Collingwood close behind, and Buckley said this weekend's clash would be a good indicator of how his side was tracking.

"We've got quite a tough draw coming in the next seven rounds," Buckley told reporters on Tuesday.

"You've got to keep finding the right physical and emotional intensity to perform week-in, week-out.

"It's not hard to get up for a game like this where you've got a quality opponent who are probably the benchmark of the competition at the moment."

The Hawks enjoyed a 22-point win over Collingwood in Round 1, but Buckley feels his team have made some big strides since then.

"We are a different side to Round 1, some of the faces are different, a lot of the faces are the same," he said.

"We believe we've grown and we're growing. We believe we're getting a greater understanding of what our best football looks like. An opponent like Hawthorn, on a week like this, is an opportunity to test that."

Hawthorn are likely to be without star forward Lance Franklin, who suffered a hamstring strain against GWS in Round 15, but the Collingwood coach said they would still present a formidable challenge.

"Hawthorn have got some great talent in their side so they're not just a one-man team and they proved that on the weekend with their performance against the Bulldogs," he said.

"I'm sure if Clarko (Hawks coach Alastair Clarkson) had a choice he'd have Buddy playing, and the unpredictability's okay for a couple of weeks, but as coaches you try and make the best of what you've got to work with and Hawthorn have a lot to work with."

Buckley was buoyed by the performance of Dale Thomas in their 31-point victory over Geelong on Saturday night, and said the midfielder had done well to recover from a foot injury that restricted his training in the lead-up to the match.

"Daisy (Thomas) pulled up well, he did remarkably well to come up after the injury against Carlton," Buckley said.

"Very rarely do footballers take the field at 100 percent fitness. At this time of year it takes some mental toughness to be able to perform."

And the Pies coach also paid tribute key trio Scott Pendlebury, Chris Tarrant and Nathan Brown, who made returns from injury in the win over the Cats.

"(For) Pendles to come back and hit the ground running was excellent. I thought Taz (Tarrant) provided some real spark for us in front of the ball," he said.

"And Nathan Brown has worked his way back after 18 months in the wilderness and is working to some solid form."