Jaeger O’Meara believes the split round has come at the right time for the Gold Coast SUNS, giving the team the opportunity to re-group ahead of the final six matches of the home and away season.

The playing group flew back to the Gold Coast following the Bulldogs match and after a meeting on Monday, have commenced a four day break before returning to training on Saturday.

“It’s going to be a tough run home but we’ve got a few days off now. We’ll review that game and have a little break and a well-needed rest and we’ll look to attack the last part of the season full-on,’’ O’Meara told The Courier Mail.

O’Meara said the team simply didn’t compete for long enough to defeat the Bulldogs in Cairns on Saturday.

“It probably comes down to us playing a quarter of hard footy and the Bulldogs played three quarters of hard footy. I think we only won the contested footy and tackles in one quarter so they were better than us on the night.

“We pride ourselves on the contested footy and tackling. We only did that in the second quarter and that is not going to be good enough to beat any side, it’s disappointing,” O’Meara said.

The midfielder also dismissed claims the SUNS couldn’t win without skipper Gary Ablett.

“We are good enough to beat sides without Gary. He’s obviously a key player in our team but I think we’ve got enough depth in our side now to win games without him,’’ he said.

Gold Coast’s next match will be against Brisbane at the Gabba on Saturday July 26.