MASON Redman went from hospital to best afield within a week, with Essendon coach Ben Rutten praising his defender's performance against North Melbourne on Sunday.

The attacking half-back was substituted out of the Bombers' tight loss to Collingwood last week and coughed up blood post-game after a heavy landing from a marking contest. 

But a week later he was a key playmaker in the Bombers' 48-point win over the Kangaroos, which was the club's fourth win from its past five games in an end-of-year form spike.

BOMBERS V KANGAROOS Full match details and stats

Rutten said Redman, who is a free agent next season, had needed late clearance to be available to face the Roos before he gathered 32 disposals, 10 marks and kicked a long goal. 

03:05

Rd 20 | Redman post-game

He was a presence in both attack and defence in our round 20 win and Mason Redman chats to us about the win and his form in recent weeks.

"He ended up in hospital to get cleared of anything substantial or serious, which he was. And then it was a bit about comfort level throughout the week so he was very quiet throughout the early part of the week. He did enough in our main session to feel confident and we probably still needed final sign-off yesterday for him," Rutten said post-game.

"To come out and perform the way he did was really pleasing."

The Bombers were without star midfield trio Darcy Parish (calf), Andrew McGrath (health and safety protocols) and Dylan Shiel (hamstring), but managed to kickstart plenty of their attack from defence as they recorded their highest score of the year – 17.12 (114) – against the likely wooden spooners. 

"As a result of losing some territory and field position from clearance we were putting our backs under a bit of pressure and then had to move the ball the length of the ground," Rutten said.

07:54

Rd 20 | Rutten post-game

Watch Ben Rutten's post-game press conference after round 20's match against North Melbourne.

"It's not the ideal way we want it but the way our backs stood up [was great]. There were some huge efforts from (Brandon Zerk-Thatcher) and I thought Redman's 120-minute performance was pretty impressive for us and he's been doing a lot of that throughout the course of this season."

Kangaroos counterpart Leigh Adams was pleased with much of his team's efforts through the game but frustrated by its inability to make the most of its play. 

"The game was looking the way we want but a little bit of a combination of our fundamentals of being able to finish our work and connection forward of centre probably hurt us," he said.