How Low Can They Crow: Former Adelaide coaches Malcolm Blight, Graham Cornes, Brenton Sanderson and Mark Bickley on the state of the club
Former Adelaide coaches Graham Cornes and Malcolm Blight have highlighted the club’s clear issues. But Brenton Sanderson is ‘in the minority’, backing the Crows to turn things around quickly.
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Two former Adelaide coaches have questioned the team’s mental strength on the back of a string of narrow defeats that has left its finals chances in tatters.
Inaugural Crows coach Graham Cornes called the side’s struggle to cope with being favourites a “psychological weakness”, while dual premiership mentor Malcolm Blight said some players would be lacking belief they could win tight games.
Over the past two years, Adelaide has a 9-1-7 record when favoured by bookmakers and are 2-1-9 in matches decided by eight points or fewer.
The Crows’ eight-point home loss to one-win Richmond last Thursday night left Adelaide in 15th spot on the ladder with its top-eight hopes all but over.
While acknowledging injuries to several key players had hampered the team, Cornes said there had been a costly lapse in attitude the past two games.
“It is a mental issue, a psychological weakness that they’ve displayed over the last couple of years when they go into games that they’re favourite,” Cornes told this masthead.
“There’s a subconscious complacency that creeps in.
“‘We’re only playing Hawthorn, now we’re playing Richmond who have only won one game and we’re at Adelaide Oval, we’ll be right’.
“It doesn’t work like that.”
The Crows hired a new performance psychologist during the off-season in a bid to improve in close games, help players’ mindset and deal with pressure.
Club chief executive Tim Silvers conceded last weekend that the team might have been burdened by the weight of expectation this season.
Blight said he had no doubt some Adelaide players would be “shrinking” in tight matches, going too cautious and not believing the team would prevail.
“How many? One is too many, two is far too many and three’s disastrous,” Blight, who led the club to flags in 1997 and 1998, told this masthead.
“As a player, I never thought you couldn’t win (close games) or get a kick and do something about it.
“But I do know that some players go within themself – they don’t want to make a mistake.
“I call it shrinking.
“Somehow you’ve got to get that belief back into the group.
“Some teams win close games and some don’t, and I think it’s that mentality of ‘we can still win this’.”
Cornes laid blame at list management, rather than Matthew Nicks or the coaching department.
He said Nicks, who took over at the start of the Crows’ rebuild in 2020 and had led the club to 18th, 15th, 14th and 10th, should not be on notice, having endured the toughest task of any Crows coach.
Cornes instead lamented the lack of top-end talent and holes in the squad.
“Injuries have impacted them more than probably a dozen other teams because their depth isn’t great,” he said.
“We don’t have enough big-bodied midfielders.
“We don’t have the intercept marking rebounding defender.
“Who are the forwards who are going to take over from Taylor Walker when he’s not there and Riley Thilthorpe’s injured?
“Who’s the matchwinning ruckman? Reilly O’Brien is a warrior and warhorse, but he’s not the footballer that Max Gawn or Brodie Grundy is.”
Brenton Sanderson, who coached Adelaide from 2012-14, backed Nicks to turn things around.
Sanderson said the club should not make any rash calls and needed to wait until the end of the season to analyse the entire campaign.
“I’m probably in the minority but I’m quite bullish about them,” Sanderson told this masthead.
“I rate the coach, I like the game style – probably more so what they showed in 2023 – but unfortunately they haven’t been able to replicate their best form often enough.
“That’s probably a combination of injuries and form, plus a couple of games things haven’t quite gone their way.”
The Crows host ladder-leading Sydney on Saturday night before heading into the bye.
Sanderson said deep down Adelaide players would probably know they would need to be at their best to cause an upset, but he was not writing them off.
“Footy changes really quickly,” he said.
“A team can get confidence, get key personnel back and the whole dynamic of the season can change.”
Four ex-Adelaide coaches share their views on where the four-win Crows go from here:
GRAHAM CORNES
CROWS COACH 1991-94
“(As pressure mounts) you just work through it – you can’t hide from it, particularly in Adelaide. It’s a combined effort with coaching staff and players. I’m confident they can bring the attitude that’s required. But I’m not confident their talent is deep enough, that’s the big issue. (The external pressure) would be impacting on Matty Nicks but you get within the four walls of the club and onto the training ground, and you’re insulated from it. And you’re supported by coaching staff around you and the players. They’re all in it together. There’s plenty of ways to get players’ confidence back and they’ve got a professional sports psychologist down there. You remind players what they’re capable of doing by showing them what they’ve done and excite them with the opportunities of what’s to come. (Playing Sydney), you love ‘unwinnable’ games because so many unwinnable games are winnable. It just gets back to the basics, contest by contest. But they’ve got to be prepared to use the ball better too because their skills have been disappointing. It’s not something you can rectify overnight – and it comes back to talent”.
MALCOLM BLIGHT
CROWS COACH 1997-99
“It’s a mental fight every week when you lose, particularly when you get multiple losses over multiple years. It eats away at you. Matthew Nicks started from a very low base and you can’t imagine some of the courage that takes. He’ll still get more and more resilient. He’s still a young coach. As you try to climb up the ladder, you need a lot of things to go right. Port Adelaide’s won four games by a total of 20 points and they have eight wins. The Crows have lost four games and drawn one with a total of 21 points. So they’re a kick or two away from being around eight wins. Collingwood can get away with injuries because they’ve been up the top for six of the last seven years. But (Taylor) Walker and (Izak) Rankine are missing and they’re A-graders. Then you’ve got (Wayne) Milera, (Nick) Murray, (Riley) Thilthorpe, plus all the others who have been out. So it’s been a bit unsettled. Those close losses drastically hurt you at the end of the year. Getting that lucky bounce of the ball, having a great set up, a great system. But every time I look at those close games, I can show 20 other things 15 minutes before all that happened, where a touch of luck went the other way too. What they’ve got to do now is hang tough and hopefully the worm turns. You’ve got to front up with hope and some system. I’d do something a bit different to try to spark it up and you might just get something. There is a chance to play one or two newbies … but if your form is terrible in the SANFL, sorry, you’re not getting a game just because you haven’t played yet.”
BRENTON SANDERSON
CROWS COACH 2012-14
“They’re still quite a young group and it looks like the confidence level of the team isn’t quite where it needs to be. But I’m still quite optimistic they can recapture their best form this year. I think the coach is a good coach. I think his philosophy – that contested style – holds up in finals. I know they haven’t been able to test that yet. They’ve just got to get their best 22 on the park, recapture some confidence and I think they’ll be fine. While everyone probably expected Adelaide to beat Richmond, at their best Richmond beat Sydney earlier in the season. With a young group, the Crows are still learning how to ensure a winning culture becomes a habit, which is one of the biggest challenges with any team. I’m obviously not the coach, but I’d look at setting up some internal goals – not losing at Adelaide Oval this year, then pinching a couple of big scalps on the road. It would be foolish to write them off and if they can get a couple of wins, in such an even season, they could be right there when the whips are cracking later in the year”.
MARK BICKLEY
CROWS CARETAKER COACH IN 2011 (SPEAKING ON SEN)
“Footy clubs are like a wheel and all the departments are like spokes so you need to have all of them working in unison to get the result, so it’s not just one department that needs fixing, it’s a continual improvement in all. List management and recruiting is a flashpoint for a lot of people who say ‘let’s change that over’, but that is not a quick fix. If you change it over, you’re still two, three, four years away from seeing any sort of big results, I would think. My focus would be on what’s happening on the ground. Adelaide have got some injuries and what this has exposed is their depth is not quite to the level. There was just too many players last game who you would have question marks if they’re ready for the level or up to the level and that’s Adelaide’s issue at the moment. People are saying ‘have we recruited the right style of player?’ Adelaide had a focus on contested players. There’s a lot of that style. Do they have enough who are speedy and can kick the ball and break the game open? That’s what they should be focusing on – how do we get our game style back up and moving and be executed with the players we have in the team at the moment?”
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Originally published as How Low Can They Crow: Former Adelaide coaches Malcolm Blight, Graham Cornes, Brenton Sanderson and Mark Bickley on the state of the club
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