A consistent four-quarter effort propelled Essendon VFL to a big 51-point win over North Melbourne at Windy Hill on Sunday.

There were hefty contributions across the board from the Bombers' AFL contingent, with Jordan Ridley making his return from a quad injury and Nick Bryan producing a season-best effort from the ruck.

Avoiding the second-half lapses seen in previous weeks, the Bombers put the foot down and showcased some of their best footy for the year against the Kangaroos, an element of their performance that Senior Coach Blake Caracella has been keen to improve.

"We’ve been trying to address our second halves throughout the year and every week we’ve made progress in that area, with another really positive step this week," Caracella said.

"We’re a team still quite young in terms of VFL experience and although we’ve lost some close ones from dying out late in games, we had eight shots on goal to three in the third term on Sunday.

"The players are improving individually and as a result, the collective gets better too – we’re keen for what’s ahead."

Caracella talks us through the performances of our 12 AFL-listed players from Sunday's win at Windy Hill. 

Sam Weideman

17 disposals, five marks, two tackles

‘Weids’ came back in after missing last week as an AFL emergency and looked really solid in defence, where he’s spent the last two or three games.

He provides great leadership for the younger defenders in our team and stopped plenty of the Roos’ attack, so we’ve been really pleased with how he’s going back there.

Jordan Ridley

19 disposals, three marks, two tackles

‘Rids’ is obviously a really good player and he didn’t miss a beat on return.

He had 19 touches in the first half before being rested and provided real bounce for us, as well as some defensive presence in the air.

It’s good to have him back up and going.

Lewis Hayes

15 disposals, five marks

‘Hayesy’ got the job done pretty nicely considering we played quite tall in defence (with Weideman, Ridley and Reid alongside him).

He had to be flexible in playing on both talls and smalls at times and applied good pressure in the back half – his last five or six weeks have been pretty consistent.

Nick Bryan

40 hit-outs, 25 disposals, 15 clearances, three marks, three tackles, two goals

An amazing game, really.

His follow-up work at clearances was terrific and he provided a real threat up forward hitting the scoreboard too.

He’s been building for a few weeks and the stats told the story on the weekend, it was just a dominant effort from him.

Nate Caddy

14 disposals, seven marks, two goals

‘Cads’ keeps improving and Sunday was his best game for the club so far.

He’s a real threat in the air even on a wet day, and his ground ball is getting better each week as well, learning a few more tricks and adding some strings to his bow as a key forward.

He’s taken a lot from the opening rounds and he’s looking really exciting.

Zach Reid

21 disposals, 10 marks, four tackles

You can just see that ‘Reidy’s a really good player.

He’s obviously still young and developing, but he reads the ball well in the air, positions himself in the right spots, uses the footy cleanly and defends strongly.

We’re pretty lucky to have such a strong aerial presence down there.

Luamon Lual

13 disposals, two marks, two tackles

‘Luey’ played down back and we considered moving him up to the wing at a couple of stages, but he held his own really well.

He won some big contests at ground level in wet conditions, which was a real highlight of his game that showed how clean he can be for us.

Jayden Davey

Six disposals, one tackle

A bit of a quieter day for Jayden, but he still looks dangerous when he gets opportunities.

He and Tex (Wanganeen) are still building well together as small forwards and we’ll see more of that as the year goes on.

Archie Roberts

24 disposals, five marks, three tackles

I thought ‘Robbo’ was really good for us again.

As we’ve noted, he loves getting involved in the contest and throwing his weight around, so the wet weather game suited him.

With that, he still looked clean with his hands and was able to get onto that left foot to create some plays for us going forward.

13 of his touches on the wing were contested, so these things are boding really well for his future.

Vigo Visentini

10 hit-outs, eight disposals, three tackles, one goal

‘Vigs’ played more forward while ‘Bristle’ was having a day out in the ruck, but still pinched in with 10 hit-outs when he got his chance in there.

The stats don’t always reflect his influence on the game for us, he’s doing some really clever things both with and without the ball that we’re definitely noticing.

For a young player of his size and in tough conditions for the talls, he was really clean again.

Tex Wanganeen

10 disposals, five tackles

Tex’s pressure was really good and played a role in locking the footy in our forward 50 for longer stages of the game.

Along with Jayden, he mightn’t have had the scoring opportunities like in previous weeks, but the intent’s been really good and those rewards will come soon.

Jye Menzie

13 disposals, eight marks, three tackles

After half-time we moved ‘Menz’ to the wing, which was a bit foreign for him but he took to it well.

It’s always good for your development as a player and the system when you can play multiple positions – he found a good mix of supporting in defence and joining the counter, so it was a pretty solid game for him.