Twenty minutes of madness is costing the Crows games, says defender Daniel Talia

DANIEL Talia says 20 minutes of madness is costing Adelaide matches and he has put the heat on his men to stand up for four quarters against the Western Bulldogs on Friday night.

Port Adelaide’s Steven Motlop kicked the winning goal in Showdown 44

DANIEL Talia says 20 minutes of madness is costing Adelaide matches and he has put the heat on his men to stand up for four quarters against the Western Bulldogs on Friday night.

While last year’s grand finalists are comfortably placed in fourth position with a 5-3 record, Talia said the Crows need to stamp out concerning lapses which he claims cost them Showdown 44.

Port Adelaide kicked five unanswered goals in the third and fourth quarters in the derby to overhaul a 27-point deficit just a week after a then-winless Carlton had six scoring shots, kicking 3.3, without reply in the second term.

And in round one, Essendon came from 20 points behind at the final change to beat Adelaide by 12.

Charlie Dixon of the Power tackles Daniel Talia of the Crows.

“We are letting ourselves down with 20 minutes of football here and there, so we’ve got to fix that up,’’ said Talia.

“We’re having 20-minute patches where teams are getting a run on and scoring multiple goals against us.

“There are going to be momentum shifts in games but when that happens we need to be able to limit the damage.

“At the moment teams are getting five-or-six goals in a row against us and it really hurts you, puts you under scoreboard pressure, so that is something we are working on.’’

Talia said changing momentum starts at the contest, noting that Port’s midfield took control of the Showdown in the third quarter.

“We got beaten badly out of the clearances which put us under pressure but we’ve got to be better at holding the momentum back,’’ he said.

“We’ve got to stop having bad patches if we are going to beat the better teams.’’

Talia says Adelaide, which has been hit by a succession of injuries this season, is not playing as well as last year.

“Because we’ve allowed opposition teams to really get a run on,’’ he said.

But he noted premierships aren’t won in April and May.

“We’re playing some good footy but we’ve still got another level to go to,’’ Talia said.

“We’ve got some good players out of the side, which hasn’t helped us, but we’ve got to look beyond that.

“The good thing is that it’s a long season and you don’t need to be playing your best at this time of the year to win a flag, as we saw last year with Richmond timing its run really well and the Bulldogs doing the same the year before.’’

Talia described Friday night's clash against the Dogs at Adelaide Oval as a “must-win’’ game as the Crows end a four-week block where they didn’t have to leave SA.

“It’s really important that we win this game because we set ourselves to win at least three of these four matches and we’ve already lost one,’’ he said.