Adelaide in the box seat to end 19-year Grand Final drought after powerful performance against GWS

ADELAIDE is in the box seat to advance to the Grand Final after earning a home preliminary final and the best news is Rory Sloane is still to come back into this team, MICHELANGELO RUCCI writes.

Mitch McGovern, Charlie Cameron and Taylor Walker celebrate a goal. Picture: Sarah Reed

THEY are going to be hard to stop now. Too hard, particularly when the Crows will take their next step towards a long-awaited return to AFL glory through a home preliminary final at Adelaide Oval in a fortnight.

And they will get there on the strength of many rather than just a few — a theme that was reinforced at the Oval on Thursday night when Adelaide beat the AFL’s most-talented list in Greater Western Sydney by again reinforcing how team football counts most in September.

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The Adelaide Football Club’s vision of a return to the MCG for the last Saturday in September should end after 19 years.

Vice-captain — and key midfielder — Rory Sloane will return for Adelaide’s first home preliminary final since 2006.

Mitch McGovern, Charlie Cameron and Taylor Walker celebrate a goal. Picture: Sarah Reed

And Sloane will take his place in the engine room knowing there is not so much pressure on his shoulders because others have lived to coach Don Pyke’s ethos of everyone needing to contribute. All in, it is.

The Crouch lads — All-Australian Matt and older brother Brad — are now blossoming to all that the Adelaide recruiting staff imagined in 2012 while being creative, particularly with the GWS start-up draft rules, to work through a landmine being set out by the AFL Commission.

To be at this point — one win from a Grand Final — after five years, with all the other turmoil endured at West Lakes, underlines how the Crows have built an incredibly tough backbone while other AFL clubs have fallen to their knees.

Rory Sloane missed the qualifying final after appendix surgery but is expected to be fit for the preliminary final in a fortnight. Picture: Sarah Reed

Adelaide appears so much stronger than the Crows did a year ago when Pyke left the semi-final loss to Sydney at the SCG knowing he had to make his players harder for the contest.

Now they are brutal, particularly in harassing their opponents. To have left so many Giants players, with unquestioned skills, appear so unsure with their hands is proof that these Crows are now conditioned for finals.

Just as in 1997-98, during that breakthrough premiership run under Malcolm Blight, there is another heartbreak story from an untimely injury.

Brodie Smith has suffered a serious knee injury. Picture: Sarah Reed

Rebounding defender Brodie Smith had his premiership dream crumble to a serious right-knee injury in the 10th minute of the first term while trying to turn with a twist to make a tackle.

Smith has made a significant contribution, particularly in the second half of the home-and-away season, to Adelaide’s premiership run.

He could be the latest to add to the growing case for AFL premiership medals being awarded to more than the 22 who play on Grand Final day.

Surely that debate is still not for the “too hard” basket?