Carlton swingman Lachie Henderson says his teammates have taken a hard look at themselves and want to take a stand against Essendon on Saturday.

The Blues have had a disappointing start to the year losing to Richmond and West Coast in the opening two rounds.

Speaking on SEN on Friday, Henderson said they’re keeping the start to the season in perspective.

“The mood’s been pretty good this week. We've tried to keep it real positive and learn from what we’ve done over last couple of weeks,” Henderson said.

“We just sat down as a group and said to each other, as a leadership group, that we need to stand up and lead by example.”

In both matches so far this year, the Blues have started well before being overrun.

Henderson said he believes it's the simple things that have let the side down.

“It’s that old thing of sticking to structures and doing the one percenters, and I think we go away from that,” he said.

“We’ve got to learn to hold it out when teams come, which they’re going to these days as it’s a very even competition.

“We need to stick to what we know and stick to what we’ve trained – we’ve been too easy to go away from that.”