High-scoring Adelaide has best chance to win a premiership since the Malcolm Blight era, says club great Darren Jarman

PREMIERSHIP hero Darren Jarman says Adelaide has its best chance to win a flag since going back-to-back in 1997-98.

POWERFUL FORCE: Adelaide captain Taylor Walker leads the club in goals with 48. Picture: Michael Klein

PREMIERSHIP hero Darren Jarman says Adelaide has its best chance to win a flag since going back-to-back in 1997-98.

Jarman, who kicked 11 goals in the Crows’ two grand final wins, rates this year’s top-of-the-table team as the best attacking unit Adelaide has had since the Malcolm Blight era.

As the Crows tonight face their next big test against perennial powerhouse Sydney — the club that knocked them out of last year’s premiership race — Jarman said their ability to hit the scoreboard made them deserved flag favourites.

“They can kick 20 goals on the bit, their scoring power is elite — and that’s what makes them so dangerous in the finals,’’ Australian Football Hall of Famer Jarman said.

“I just love how attacking they are and how many goalscoring options they have.

“The secret to winning big finals is being able to score heavily and Adelaide’s forward line is so potent and so well put together that it’s a case of if one doesn’t get you another one will.’’

The Crows, who play the Swans tonight and West Coast in the last round, are just one win away from claiming the McLelland Trophy as minor premier for just the second time and first since 2005.

Adelaide finished top at the end of the home-and-away season in 2005 and second in 2006 under coach Neil Craig before stumbling in the finals and failing to make the grand final.

Darren Jarman and Andrew McLeod celebrate at the siren of the 1997 grand final against St Kilda.

Jarman believes Craig was “too negative in those finals series’’ to win the ultimate prize but that second-year Crows coach Don Pyke has found the attacking formula for success.

“Being able to kick winning scores in finals is the secret,’’ said Jarman, who kicked six and five goals respectively in Adelaide’s 1997 and 1998 grand final wins against St Kilda and North Melbourne.

“That’s why Hawthorn was able to win so many flags from 2008 to 2015. They couldn’t be stopped from scoring.’’

The Hawks averaged 16.5 goals in their four winning grand finals in that period, kicking 18 in 2008, 11 in 2013, 21 in 2014 and 16 in 2015.

“They had the same attacking philosophy that we had at the Crows when Blight was coach (from 1997-99) and Pyke’s team is the same,’’ Jarman told The Advertiser.

“Blighty’s philosophy was 21 goals beats 20 and it doesn’t matter how many the opposition kick as long as you kick more.’’

Adelaide is averaging a league-best 113.2 points a game — 15.2 points higher than the next-ranked scoring side Geelong.

It has four players ranked in the top-14 for goals — captain Taylor Walker (48), small forward Eddie Betts (45) and key forward Josh Jenkins (38).

Versatile forward Tom Lynch has contributed 27 goals while the speedy Charlie Cameron has chipped in with 22.

“You complement that with a solid defence and a vastly-improved midfield with the Crouch brothers (Matt and Brad) starting to dominate to such an extent that they might soon calling them the Krakouer brothers and the Crows will take a power of beating,’’ Jarman said.

Jarman said the biggest threat to Adelaide’s pursuit of a first premiership since 1998 is an injury to lead ruckman Sam Jacobs, saying “there’s no-one else who can fill his role’’.

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