Melbourne Rebels captain Stirling Mortlock believes short-term pain will result in long-term gain for the fledgling Super Rugby club.
The Rebels closed their debut season with a 27-24 home loss to Australian rivals Western Force on Friday night.
It was their ninth successive defeat, a run that started after the Rebels had boasted an encouraging 3-4 win-loss record.
In reflecting on their inaugural campaign, Mortlock acknowledged the disappointment the playing group felt at not building on an enterprising start, but also showed his optimistic side.
"What we've done off the pitch has been a resounding success, the connection with the community and fans has been outstanding," Mortlock said.
"From our perspective internally, result-wise, we're certainly not happy with the way things panned out."
"But take a step back and we're the first team in their first year to win more than one game, albeit we won three within the first six or seven rounds, we wanted to kick on. The season picks up towards the back end and the good teams stand up at that time."
"That journey in the last nine weeks will be invaluable for us next year, I've got no doubt about it, going through tough things always make you stronger."
"We've loved the journey, put some building blocks and no doubt we'll get bigger and better next year."
The Rebels will be boosted in 2012 with the arrival of exciting Wallabies pair Kurtley Beale and James O'Connor, but will lose experienced trio Kevin O'Neill, Sam Cordingley and Greg Somerville through retirement.
Also departing is coach Rod Macqueen, who heads upstairs as a director of coaching, to be replaced by assistant Damien Hill.
Macqueen, who steered Australia to World Cup glory in 1999, is confident he has helped build a solid foundation in Melbourne.
"I can see only good things happening for this side," Macqueen said.
"Whilst I'm sad in some ways that I'm not involved in the day-to-day coaching, I'm buoyed the team's got a good and long future in Melbourne."
"I'm proud of what this club's done, not just on the field, but off. Rugby's good for Melbourne and Melbourne's embraced rugby."
While disappointed he couldn't end his coaching career on a winning note, Macqueen was at his philosophical best.
"Once again we got into positions we should have scored tries from but we didn't, it has been a characteristic of the side," Macqueen said.
"I think there was some good things in that game again, we came back from two tries down to get back into the game, could have won it and only missed out on the bell."