AFL 2024: Inside Adelaide Crows crippling pre-season casualty ward

Adelaide has enjoyed a relatively kind injury run over the past two seasons. It’s why the club’s pre-season injury crisis is so alarming, writes SIMEON THOMAS-WILSON.

It is an unusually busy time in the medical room at West Lakes.

Outside of last year’s run with injuries to defenders that had Crows senior coach Matthew Nicks wondering what was happening in their backline meetings to attract this bad luck, Adelaide has largely been on the right side of the ledger over the past two seasons.

But with Rory Sloane (eye), Jordon Butts (hamstring), Jake Soligo (ankle) and Wayne Milera (hamstring) joining an ever-growing injury room that already had Nick Murray (knee) and Harry Schoenberg (Achilles) from last season.

Since highly rated fitness guru Darren Burgess became the high performance manager at West Lakes, the Crows have had one of the better records in the AFL when it comes to games lost to injury to players in their best team.

In 2022 despite the now retired Paul Seedsman not playing a game because of concussion, and Sloane suffering an ACL injury early on in the season, the Crows had the seventh best record when it came to players from their best team missing games to injuries.

Last season while the Crows defensive stocks were hit hard with eventual season-ending knee and foot injuries to Murray, the now departed Tom Doedee, Butts and Chayce Jones they were still right around the bottom for games lost to injuries for players in their best team.

Adelaide also lost star forward Izak Rankine to a hamstring injury for three matches towards the end of 2023.

Adelaide is dealing with a full casualty ward.

But the last week was particularly brutal for the Crows on the injury front.

On Monday Milera re-injured the hamstring he hurt it prior to Christmas, Sloane had surgery on a detached retina on Tuesday night after he experienced symptoms following training, on Wednesday Soligo had to be helped off the ground after badly rolling his ankle and then on Friday Butts pulled up clutching his right hamstring.

With Sloane also dealing with some hamstring issues prior to Christmas, some Crows fans may be forgiven for having some not so nice flashbacks to the spate of hamstring issues Adelaide copped in 2018 - which led to the club scrapping aspects of its new muscle-strengthening training program.

Milera and Butts are expected to be sidelined for the next couple of weeks, while the Crows are optimistic Soligo - who is in a moon boot - has avoided any serious damage but are waiting for the swelling to go down.

Sloane is the big unknown with his playing future unclear after his second eye surgery in two years.

Wayne Milera suffered another injury set back. Picture: AFC

The former Crows captain’s initial recovery period is set to lapse by Monday with the 33-year-old then expected to see a specialist - ahead of any potential return to training plan.

Sloane played 22 games for the Crows last year after returning from an ACL injury.

But 2024 is widely expected to be the last year for the out-of-contract Sloane.

And while he found a spot on the wing for the Crows in 2023, it was still yet to be seen as to where he would fit in Adelaide’s side in 2024.

Before he was sent in for surgery, Sloane was used by the Crows as a defender in match simulation on Monday - before joining in with midfielders at the end of the session for craft work.

Milera, Butts and Soligo are definitely in the Crows strongest side for 2024, Murray is a likely inclusion as he continues to impress with his development as a key defender.

While Schoenberg played the final five games of 2023 for the Crows.

The Crows ended 2023 with Irishman Mark Keane and the previously untried James Borlase as their key defensive options.

Butts should be back for Round 1, but who will be with him in defence?

Josh Worrell has a golden chance to continue his fine form in replacing Doedee as an intercepting third tall, while after a sensational first season Max Michalanney has grown and put on some size and could be in line to play on bigger bodies after taking the opposition’s most dangerous small forward in his debut campaign.

Jordan Butts is dealing with a hamstring injury. Picture: Mark Brake/Getty Images

Crows fans would love to see No. 8 draft pick Dan Curtin in the side for Round 1, and at 197cm he would definitely give Adelaide’s defence some height.

But given he would be likely manning the second best tall forward of the opposition, would that be throwing him in at the deep end?

The troubles of Fischer McAsey as a key defender in his first season after he was selected by the Crows with the sixth pick of the 2019 draft will surely be at the front of mind for many at West Lakes.

Injuries are unavoidable in footy, how you minimise them key.

The Crows have done this well over the last two years, will the last week be an outlier or is there more pain in store?