BRISBANE LIONS coach Leigh Matthews said his team's 22-point win over Fremantle at the Gabba on Sunday had provided a great launching pad to push for another finals campaign in September.

The Lions moved to 7-4 at the halfway mark of the season and have now cemented themselves in the top eight.

Matthews said with the team's confidence on the rise, next Saturday's assignment against the Western Bulldogs would provide another example of just how far they've come.

"Seven and four rates as a good first half," Matthews said.

"If you'd said to me at the start of the season we'll give you seven and four, you'd say 'yeah we'll take that'. It's a good base to build the second half of the season.

"We play well at the MCG, but the Bulldogs are obviously going as well as anyone, so it's going to be a great challenge to see if we can match it with one of the genuine top-four teams.

"Confidence tends to be a short term thing ... but the fact they've been able to come off the ground and sing the theme song (in the past month) encourages all the things that contribute to playing well, so I guess the confidence levels are pretty good."

However, Matthews admitted his team's chances could depend on the personnel they put on the field.

Daniel Bradshaw came off with a hamstring injury in the third quarter, and the Lions coach said he was "doubtful" the full forward would come up.

Livewire Scott Harding also came off in the third and never returned after injuring his knee on the "concrete" centre wicket area.

With Ashley McGrath, Josh Drummond and Jason Roe all missing from the defensive end this week, the Lions medical staff would be working overtime to get a fit team on the park for the Bulldogs.

Matthews said the Lions missed some bite from the back half against Freo.

"Over the last few weeks Josh Drummond and Ash McGrath have been giving us enormous bounce out of that back group," he said.

"Josh's kicking skills ... he has such penetration and takes such good options, and Ash has really given us some real surge out of there, and we didn't have them.

"We were playing seven defenders the last three weeks and three of them were missing this week, and two of them were more of our attacking ones. We always knew we'd be down on that ability to bounce out of that back 50."

Matthews agreed Brownlow Medallist Simon Black was playing as good as he ever had after the on-baller racked up another 28 touches in a sublime performance.