Adelaide pre-season news: Crows trialling Rory Sloane at halfback
Izak Rankine has arrived, and Luke Pedlar is making a strong case. So who misses out? Recent match-sim at West Lakes has shed more light on the Crows’ Round 1 side.
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Adelaide trialled captain Rory Sloane in one of the new positions they are considering for him in 2023 as the Crows continued preparations for their first games of 2023. Sloane, who is recovering from a torn ACL suffered in Round 5 against Richmond last year, sat out the first half of match simulation at West Lakes on Wednesday.
Still wearing a non-contact hat, when Sloane did enter the fray he played predominantly as a halfback.
In an exclusive interview with News Corp Crows senior coach Matthew Nicks said the Crows were looking at a variety of positions for the 32-year-old Sloane, who is out of contract at the end of the season, as he comes back from the ACL injury.
Sloane started the match sim on the sidelines with Luke Pedlar, Mitch Hinge and Shane McAdam.
Here’s what else stood out from Wednesday’s session.
NO BUTTS BUT NO PROBLEM
Adelaide is confident Jordon Butts’ shoulder will be fine for next week’s intraclub match with the Crows taking caution with their key defender.
Butts was on the sidelines during match simulation at West Lakes on Wednesday as the Crows look after his sore shoulder ahead of their first run of games for 2023.
The 23-year-old has become Adelaide’s No. 1 key defender over the past two years.
In his place Nick Murray and Tom Doedee were the tall defenders on the stronger blue Crows side.
IMPRESSING EARLY
Former Collingwood defender Mark Keane has started training this week with the Crows after arriving in Adelaide from Ireland.
Nicks is extremely excited about what the 22-year-old might be able to do at the Crows, with coaches impressed about the raw ability he showed at the Pies.
Keane, at 194cm, showed he can play on both smaller and taller players during match sim.
He was manning Jake Soligo for a fair bit of the session when he was on the field but showed impressive decision making and athleticism to deny Reilly O’Brien an easy mark.
He also showed he has a bit of dash on him with a burst through the middle of the ground.
ON THE OUTER?
Ned McHenry played 41 games in the last two years.
But the No. 16 pick of the 2018 Draft wasn’t part of the stronger blue side on Wednesday.
With Izak Rankine coming from Gold Coast, and Jake Soligo and Ben Keays playing more half-forward roles, McHenry might be up against it to hold his spot in the Crows best 23.
Sam Berry looks to be entrenched in the Crows first choice midfield, while Harry Schoenberg was also on the stronger blue side.
When he came onto the field, Pedlar played as a small forward for the blue side.
NICKS: MCASEY WAS RIGHT TO QUIT
The decision of Fischer McAsey to walk away from footy has led Adelaide senior coach Matthew Nicks to be more reflective of his players’ wellbeing.
McAsey quit the AFL and the Crows last month after he “lost a lot of the enjoyment and desire to improve”.
The 21-year-old was drafted at pick six in 2019, at the time the highest ever Crows selection.
He played 10 games in his first season but didn’t play at AFL level in the two years that followed.
In 2021 McAsey’s father Chris had a major health scare while the then young Crow was back in Melbourne for the first time in months due to Covid travel limitations.
After looking for a move to Victoria last trade period, McAsey was granted personal leave to remain in Melbourne.
He then pulled the pin ahead of the Crows’ return to pre-season in January.
Nicks said he had spoken to McAsey and that he had made the right decision.
“There is more to life than footy, in fact there is lot of more important things in life than footy,” Nicks said.
“One of them is happiness, one of those is being content and our industry is a very tough industry.
“I reckon if you asked the majority of people who have been in the industry if they have had tough moments and felt whether this is for me they would say yes.
“That is part of the pressure that comes with this industry and for some it isn’t for them but with Fisch he has made the right decision for him and we support that decision.
“I know it is the right decision for him, I caught up with him recently and he is doing really well at the moment so I wish him all the best.”
The decision by McAsey to walk away prompted questions about whether the Crows made the right decision in drafting him interstate and whether he was thrown into the deep end too early as a young key defender in a struggling side.
When asked if he had any regrets regarding McAsey’s time at the Crows Nicks said;
“Regrets is not the right word. But I always question things that we do.
“There are always things you want to look at, how we can do things better and of course we have looked as deep as we can at that because ultimately we want our players to enjoy playing footy.
“We don’t want them to lose their passion for the sport but as I said before it is a tough industry. Not just as a player but for anyone involved in the industry.
“We will continue to look at things we could have done better because it will be ongoing, we will have more players come in such as the guys we recently drafted and how can we make their experience enjoyable.”
On the night McAsey was drafted by the Crows, Nicks tried to convince his family that moving to Adelaide would be a good thing for him – based on his experience moving to Sydney to play for the Swans.
He said that wasn’t a red flag looking back on it.
“No not at all. There are so many moments in individuals careers when they are drafted and initially it is a really tough experience,” he said.
“Often at 18-years of age and you are leaving home it is a tough thing to get your head around.
“Rory Sloane came from Victoria and it was initially oh what do I do. Ollie Wines, I was lucky enough to be at Port Adelaide when Ollie was drafted and that wasn’t exactly what the family had planned.
“But now if you speak to those players, they have been able to develop and have loved the fact that they have been able to get away and experienced a different life to what they have had previously.”
FORGOTTEN STAR RIGHT IN THE MIX FOR CROWS’ BEST 23
Adelaide senior coach Matthew Nicks says Matt Crouch is “smashing it at the moment” in the Crows pre-season.
But after a season in which the 2017 All-Australian and Adelaide Club Champion was dropped on three occasions Crouch again looks to be in a fight for a regular spot in the side with Nicks saying “there is quite a battle” for midfield places for the Crows.
The role of Crouch, and his future at the club, became almost a running theme of Nicks’s pre game media conferences as he fell out of favour at West Lakes.
After missing all of 2021 with groin issues Crouch played 11 AFL games and eight SANFL games in 2022.
He averaged 27.4 disposals and 4.36 clearances at AFL level in 2022, but didn’t feature in the Crows senior side following the loss to Hawthorn in Round 17 – which was seen as a low point in Adelaide’s season.
Part of Crouch’s demotion to the SANFL was around the Crows’ coaches desire for him to be more penetrating with the ball.
Nicks told News Corp that he had been happy with how the 27-year-old was tracking this pre-season.
But he said there were a lot of players fighting it out for midfield spots.
“Matty is smashing it at the moment, all those mids we have a lot of guys who are going through that midfield and we are doing a lot of experimenting,” he said.
“And Matty is training extremely well at this point, he’s got areas of his game that we were working on last year that were tough for Matt.
“We are still working on them and he has demonstrated some real growth in those areas, mostly that was around the ability to really get going on offence.
“So it is a credit to Matt that he has been able to really put his head down and get the work in.
“But there is quite a battle in that midfield and it is exciting to watch. There are a lot of guys who are keen to get their hands in there and get them dirty and do the work around stoppage.
“Matty is one of them for us.”
Crouch’s lack of AFL action in 2022 led to him again testing the waters for a move away from West Lakes.
But for the second year in a row a new suitor for prolific on-baller, who is a free agent at the end of this season, could not be found.
When asked if Crouch would have had his blessing to move to another club if one came for him, Nicks said the Crows would have done what was best for them and Crouch.
“I think from that point of view we always work with the player on what is best for the footy club and then what is best for the player,” he said.
“We want our players’ experience to be an enjoyable one so they can play their best footy.
“It is hard to play your best footy when you aren’t enjoying it. So that would have been a conversation and it is a conversation that we would have with all of our players – is this something you want to do and what is best for the footy club.”
CROWS HINT AT SIGNIFICANT SWITCH-UP FOR VERSATILE YOUNGSTER
Adelaide’s highest ever draft pick Riley Thilthorpe could play more “around the ground” in 2023, Crows senior coach Matthew Nicks says.
The No. 2 pick of the 2020 draft has played 25 games for the Crows in his first two years in the AFL.
This has largely been as a tall forward, and pinch-hitting in the ruck.
But as part of an exclusive interview with News Corp, Nicks hinted that the West Adelaide product might have a new role for the Crows in 2023.
“He came to us from West Adelaide as a ruckman, he has played predominantly forward for us,” he said.
“This pre-season we have had a bit more of a look at him around the ground a bit more and we have really liked what we have seen.”
Thilthorpe has been up against Reilly O’Brien in the ruck in match sim at West Lakes on increasing occasions.
His ability to cover the ground at his height, 202cm, left Crows coaches and recruiters enamoured in his draft year.
The 20-year-old kicked five goals on debut against Hawthorn in round 6 and has 26 goals from his 25 AFL games to date.
He has also said he feels a bit more comfortable playing in the ruck in the early stages of his career.
Nicks said he had been pleased with Thilthorpe’s progression as a key forward.
“It is tough for any first year player to do it in their first season,” he said.
“It is similar doing it in your second year, especially as a key position player.
“Often you are up against grown men, ruckmen and key backs, who are five years older than you so it is quite a challenge as a young key position player coming in and making an impact.
“We feel like Riley with his development is being really fast-tracked. James Rahilly has done an outstanding job as our forwards coach in that space as has Nathan van Berlo regarding some of his work around stoppages.”
A potential positional change for Thilthorpe could open up more opportunities for some of the Crows other talls.
While Taylor Walker still looms as the leader of the Crows forward line, and Darcy Fogarty had a career best year in 2022, Elliott Himmelberg and Lachlan Gollant played 18 games between them last season.
Himmelberg’s pre-season has caught the eye at West Lakes as the Crows continue to prepare for life after Walker.
The former Crows captain signed a one-year contract last year and Nicks didn’t rule Walker from going around another year.
“That’s a hard one for me to answer, we will know more as the year plays out,” he said.
“Everyone was questioning him, probably the day I walked in the door people were questioning whether he can continue well it has been three years.
“He will continue to play until I have no doubt that he feels that he can no longer impact the game like he does now.
“I would say he has played a couple of his best years of footy in the last couple of years. It has been a challenge for him because he has experienced the highs of being right up there and in a team that played finals footy regularly and he was in one of the best sides for a period there that didn’t quite get the job done.
“He has been amazing for our group, helping others, and I think that has made him a better footballer in his own right because he now understands what he means to others.”
Have your say: Who should captain the Crows in 2023?
Adelaide is closing in on deciding its leaders for 2023 with senior coach Matthew Nicks expecting a decision to be confirmed within weeks.
Rory Sloane has been the solo captain of the Crows since 2020, Nicks’ first season, but has played just 34 games in three years because of injury.
The latest of these injuries was a torn ACL which ended his 2022 season in Round 5.
The 32-year-old has been steadfast in his insistence that he wants to remain captain of the Crows in 2023 when asked publicly.
But he has said he will do whatever is the best for the club.
When asked in an exclusive interview with News Corp about if a decision had been made on whether Sloane would continue to be captain in 2023 Nicks said;
“Well Sloaney is captain until he is not captain, whether that is a club decision or Rory makes that decision we are in that process at the moment when we talk about leadership,” he said.
“Not so much from a captaincy point of view but our leadership group, we are very open and transparent about where we sit as a group everyone has input into who the leaders of our footy club are.
“So we are in that process at this point. Normally in pre-season we use a number of our values and principles. We will often vote as a group around who we feel is that emerging leader or part of our leadership group.
“So we are in that process at the moment.”
Nicks said the Crows would finalise their leadership group within the next few weeks.
He also lauded Sloane’s captaincy of the club last year despite being on the sidelines for much of the season.
“He has been an incredible leader of this footy club, his on-field stuff can’t be questioned the way he leads by example,” he said.
“That was a challenge last year, when you aren’t playing and are injured it does make it quite tough when you can’t be out there on the ground.
“That was tough for Sloaney last year but the work that he has done to get back is a credit to what he has been able to do.
“He has been out training, we are trialling him in a number of different roles – on-ball still – but we are mindful that he is coming back from an ACL.
“So he has been on the wing, halfback, half-forward, a bit of everywhere. But he still has that outstanding leadership and will be very important for us this year.
“But we are mindful of getting ahead in that space, Sloaney is on the other side of 30 and coming off an ACL so we are very mindful that we want to make sure that he has the easiest path back.”
Dual Crows premiership captain Mark Bickley told News Corp in October that he believed Sloane was still the person to skipper the side, even though there could be debate about his place in the side as he returns from the knee reconstruction.
“People at some stage in 2023 I’m sure will question his output not being at what it was three or four years ago,” he said.
“But he brings leadership and direction to a young team, which you really can’t measure.”
If the Crows do choose to go with a new captain, or to even return to the co-captain model they had in 2019 to assist the transition, Jordan Dawson is now looming as the one to watch.
Tom Doedee was long considered the Crows’ captain in waiting, after he was added to the leadership group after just 21 games, but Dawson’s mid-season elevation in 2022 has him firmly as the one to watch.
Nicks said the Crows knew how much the former Sydney player was a leader on the field but were pleasantly surprised to find out how much this translated to off the field.
“There a number of reasons that we targeted Jordy and tried to get him back to our footy club,” he said.
“One of those standouts was his leadership. We knew about his on-field, we didn’t know a lot about his off-field only what we heard but we could see his on-field leadership playing for Sydney and the way he instructed he was just an outstanding leader on the field.
“So we knew what we were getting in that space, he has probably gone above and beyond our expectations since he has come in by leading by example in the way he plays his footy but also in the way he goes about it on the field and off the field he has been outstanding with our young group.
“He comes in with seven years experience from Sydney, that has been extremely valuable to our young group.”
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