Andrew Capel: Adelaide Crows finally ticking the right boxes in road to redemption
Adelaide has been in rebuild mode since the end of 2019. Now it’s nailed the trade period and the draft. So how did it finally turn things around?
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Nailed the trade period. Nailed the draft.
Eight months after being accused of blowing its best chance at a return to long-term respectability by beating North Melbourne in the final home-and-away round of 2021 and effectively costing itself a shot at gun South Australian teenager Jason Horne-Francis, Adelaide appears to be on the verge of an exciting new era.
Without a finals appearance since its infamous 2017 grand final loss to Richmond - and the subsequent, disastrous pre-season training camp to the Gold Coast that split the club in two - the Crows hit paydirt in the recruiting stakes in the off-season and are seeing some green shoots from players who the jury was out on.
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While the club has been in rebuilding mode since the untried Matthew Nicks replaced a mentally broken Don Pyke at the end of 2019 following two years of turmoil after the camp fiasco, only now are fans starting to see some bright light at the end of the tunnel.
It has been sparked by the astute and aggressive recruiting of former Swan Jordan Dawson in the trade period and excitement machine Josh Rachele in the draft.
South Australian Dawson, a Sturt product, decided to return home after finishing third in Sydney’s best and fairest award last season.
Port Adelaide has made a habit of beating bitter rival Adelaide for homesick players.
This time, a more aggressive Crows outfit would not take no for an answer.
They moved heaven and earth to win the battle for a player who would add some much-needed class, run and kicking ability to a largely blue-collar side.
It took a five-year deal reportedly worth about $3.2 million to secure Dawson’s services.
The long-kicking left-footer, who grew up as an Adelaide supporter, has so far been everything the club hoped for and more.
Apart from averaging 24 disposals, seven marks and 104 SuperCoach points, Dawson became the first player to win a Showdown with a goal after the final siren when he dobbed a set shot from an angle from 45 metres in round three.
The wingman won the Showdown Medal as best afield in his first Adelaide derby and immediately grabbed his jumper in jubilation, showing what his new team meant to him and perhaps pointedly highlighting to Port what it had missed out on.
The just-turned 25-year-old is a difference-maker.
And so is his new teenage sidekick Rachele.
The Crows moved many chess pieces to try to prise the number one draft pick from the Kangaroos to get their hands on South Adelaide sensation Horne-Francis, widely considered to be a once-in-a-decade talent.
But - eventually armed with pick six instead of pick four because of father-son selections - they continually hit a brick wall.
It mattered little.
Instead of securing the draft’s best midfielder, Adelaide nabbed its best small forward.
Confident but not arrogant, the former Australian under-17 soccer squad member has taken to the AFL like a duck to water.
There have been no growing pains.
The Victorian is breathtaking and after five rounds leads the Crows’ goalkicking with 12, including booting five on debut against Fremantle in round one.
Rachele has kicked goals in all five games he has played, earned the round four AFL Rising Star nomination and, remarkably, is only four goals off the Coleman Medal lead.
He has been compared to Greater Western Sydney star Toby Greene, with Power 300-gamer and four-times best and fairest Kane Cornes saying he is capable of kicking 500 career goals.
Rachele already is a fan’s favourite and the perfect small forward replacement for Eddie Betts, who was so good and popular in his six years at Adelaide from 2014-19 that he unofficially has a pocket at Adelaide Oval named after him.
For a club that has been belted from pillar to post for some of its drafting and trading in recent years - the jury is still out on first-round selections Darcy Fogarty (No. 12, 2017), Chayce Jones (9, 2018), Ned McHenry (16, 2018) and Fischer McAsey (6, 2019) - it has made some good moves of late.
While former West Adelaide key forward Riley Thilthorpe - the Crows’ highest ever draft pick at No. 2 in 2020 - is currently languishing in the SANFL, he will be a star.
His form in the past three weeks in the state league competition has been red hot.
There have been other positive signs this season.
While veteran former skipper Taylor Walker has hit the ground running in his return from a six-match suspension, kicking nine goals in two games, his key forward sidekick Elliott Himmelberg is finally showing why the Crows’ coaching staff has shown so much faith in him.
He had kicked 26 goals in 27 games in five seasons prior to this year.
In the past three weeks he has booted 10 goals, including two career-high bags of four.
Former Port tall utility Billy Frampton and young guns Brayden Cook, Lachlan Gollant and Lachlan Sholl are other young players who have improved this season while tough midfielder Sam Berry excelled in the SANFL before being given his first AFL opportunity of the year against Richmond on Easter Saturday and performing well.
Adelaide, which has posted a 2-3 win-loss record after five rounds following its strong 19-point win against the Tigers, is far from the finished product.
But it could easily be 4-1 and thinking finals had it not suffered last-gasp losses by less than a goal to Fremantle (one point) in round one and Essendon (four points) in round four.
But, most importantly, after four tough years without finals when it spiralled from second to a low point of the wooden spoon in 2020 and a battling 15th last year, it finally appears to be on the right path.
While losing veteran captain Rory Sloane for the season with a serious knee injury is a setback, it should open up a regular spot for Berry and possibly give former Giant Jackson Hately, who has been in white-hot form in the SANFL and who assistant coach James Rahilly claims is “one of the unluckiest players I have seen’’, the chance to play AFL.
The Crows have money in their salary cap to target another key recruit in the off-season, where a speedy, classy midfielder would be an ideal addition.
With such a young team, there will be more hiccups on the journey but finally there are reasons for optimism at West Lakes.
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