Adelaide General Manager of Football Adam Kelly has confirmed midfielder Rory Atkins has completely departed the club.
Atkins recently declared he would test his free agency at the end of the season, with a move to Gold Coast heavily linked.
Despite that, Kelly said the plan was for the 26-year-old to hang around the club for the rest of the 2020 season, but Atkins felt uncomfortable after revealing his decision to his teammates.
“Rory has completed his exit (meetings) with the club this week,” Kelly told SEN’s Dwayne’s World.
“We sat down with Rory in the lead-up to telling his teammates that he would be exploring his opportunities elsewhere and the intent was that he would stay around the program.
“He’s a really great character to have around and much loved by his teammates.
“We anticipated he might feel a little bit uncomfortable after telling his teammates and that ended up being the case.
“I think it was the very first team meeting that he sat in after informing everyone that he came in and said to me ‘I don’t think this is going to work’ and we said it is an uncomfortable situation when you have notified everyone that you’re moving on so he has now exited the club.”
While the Crows sit on the bottom of the ladder, Kelly says they’re not opposed to targeting mature-age players in the trade period.
“We do have a young list and we anticipate it getting younger, so if we can bring in some players with experience and help our development and growth and be part of that journey, we would entertain that,” he said.
However, Kelly ruled out Adelaide using their top draft picks in any trades.
“Our intent is to utilise our early-round draft picks. I know things can change in the trade period, but at this point we’re very much intent on utilising our first and second round draft picks,” he said.