Final-quarter heroics from Petrenko

ADELAIDE had several final-term heroes against Fremantle on Saturday, none more so than Jared Petrenko.

Jared Patrenko

ADELAIDE had several final-term heroes against Fremantle on Saturday.

None more so than Jared Petrenko, who played an integral role in winning back the lead for the Crows in the frantic fourth quarter.

Seemingly out of the contest at centre-half forward, Petrenko beat three Dockers to the ball before soccering it forward to the boundary inside Adelaide's attacking 50m arc.

This allowed the Crows to set up at the stoppage where ruckman Sam Jacobs palmed the ball down beautifully to Rory Sloane who kicked a fine goal on the run from 40m.

But if it wasn't for Petrenko's desperation, the first of Adelaide's five goals in succession may not have eventuated.

"Luckily enough the ball bounced my way," a humble Petrenko said.

"I looked up and saw nothing in front of me so I just thought I would just get it down our end because we were under pressure at that stage. Thank God it didn't go out on the full."

That didn't mean Petrenko wasn't sweating on the field umpire's whistle though, with a call for deliberate out-of-bounds also on the cards.

"I turned around straight away looking for the umpire," said Petrenko. "I would have been absolutely spewing if he pinged me for that."

Just three minutes later, Petrenko was at it again. This time his neat foot pass found Crows substitute Graham Johncock in the pocket, who put the visitors up by 11 points once he kicked truly.

"That was amazing composure from Matty Wright at the stoppage (to give Petrenko the ball) because he could have easily blazed away," Petrenko said.

"We just showed a lot of poise in those last couple of moments."

And it's fair to say winning by narrow margins is having a positive influence on everyone at West Lakes.

"Winning these close games is doing wonders for our team - it's such a great feeling around the club at the moment," Petrenko said.

"The last couple of years you weren't looking forward to going to training because we were losing every week.

"Even myself, I only had a 25 per cent winning record, so to win a lot of games this year as we've done, it's building great belief.

"Who knows what we can do?"