Essendon senior coach John Worsfold says the Bombers have options to turn to after their midfield was soundly beaten against the Western Bulldogs at Metricon Stadium on Friday night.

The Bombers were far behind in contested possessions (93 to 128) and clearances (23 to 30) in the 42-point loss, with best-afield ruckman Tim English setting up the Bulldogs' midfield dominance.

While Essendon ruckman Andrew Phillips battled hard with 28 disposals, 10 disposals and two contested marks, Worsfold said he could turn to veteran Tom Bellchambers against Adelaide next week.

The 31-year-old has missed the past two matches as he manages his game-time, but is feeling fresh again.

"Tom's feeling much better," Worsfold said. 

"We've managed his program to get some work into him. He's got a lot of soreness out and he's moving really well, he's had a couple of hitouts in the match sim work we've been doing.

"Sam Draper has played a couple of games now. He's sat out for 12 months (ACL) but is progressing really well.

"We've got options we can consider. That doesn't mean that we don’t have faith that Phillips, after getting a good week this week to freshen up, could do the job for us."

The Bombers fell to their sixth consecutive defeat against the Bulldogs, having not beaten them since 2014.

They blooded a youthful midfield against one of the competition's premier midfields, missing stars Dylan Shiel and Dyson Heppell and part-time midfielder Jake Stringer.

While Worsfold didn't use the trio's absence as an excuse, he said the Bulldogs' engine room was "miles above" for experience.

"We see that their midfield has a lot of strengths that tend to come out against us. We've struggled against them in that area. They have a lot more maturity in that midfield," he said.

"We were relatively young for big parts of it with Snelling and McGrath in there, and (debutant) Cahill in there at times. We didn't really have old, experienced guys that we could get through there.

"We had Ham and Hibberd on the wings matching up against Hunter and Macrae, so their experience in that area of the game is miles above ours. That's a real strength of the Bulldogs, and that's an area we're going to build as our mids play more footy together and mature as young footballers."

The Bombers will look to rebound when they face Adelaide at Adelaide Oval in round eight on the back of a nine-day break.