After a promising start to the season, Adelaide once again finds themselves at 3-6 and Kane Cornes isn’t sure where they are at.
The Crows were super competitive against Brisbane for a half but gave up nine goals after the main break to go down by 36 points.
Cornes believes they’re having issues working out what their best 22 actually is.
“They started the season really well, they went 3-1, they then lost their next five. This year they were 3-3, so started pretty well, have lost their last three by 59, 48 and 36,” he said on SEN SA Breakfast.
“They’ve hit a roadblock. They seem confused in terms of what they want to do from a personnel point of view, significant changes at selection heading into this game for no avail.
“They play St Kilda this week and the following week they take on Geelong so it’s not going to get much easier for them.
“They have to find a way to stick in. When they’re at their best and when they bring the pressure and the heat, they’re a hard side to play against as we saw in the first half.”
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Cornes called out the club’s list management, coming into the season with only one AFL-level ruckman in Reilly O’Brien, who was omitted on the weekend.
“I don’t know what they’re trying to do at selection. I just didn’t get the dropping of Reilly O’Brien. He gave you a better chance than what Kieren Strachan did,” he said.
“I also don’t get the fact that they went into the year with one ruck on their list essentially – so what’s their plan long term? Is O’Brien your guy or are you going to go and get a ruckman because Strachan isn’t going to be a long-term prospect as a ruck.
“I don’t know, is O’Brien their ruckman for the next three to four years, you’d have to say no given he’s lost his spot. What are they going to do there? Are they going to recruit one finally?
“I’m not sure what the plan would be. Some of their list management calls have been disastrous really and this continues to be the case.
“Darcy Fogarty doesn’t have AFL attitudes and I don’t think will ever make it at the level. Fischer McAsey is languishing in the SANFL, the midfielders they’ve recruited are all the same type.
“Chayce Jones was a midfielder, now he’s a defensive half back. We’ve been through it at length and nothing is a reflection of how good a coach Matthew Nicks could be if you don’t have the cattle and you’ve been set up to fail by poor list management choices as we’ve seen at North Melbourne, then that’s going to be a long road out of this rebuild.”
The status of number two draft pick Riley Thilthorpe has been questioned, given he hasn’t featured at AFL level since Round 1.
Assistant coach Scott Burns hopes we see him back in the side this weekend.
“We wanted to get Riley back in a little while ago, but it hasn’t been that simple,” Burns told SEN SA Breakfast.
“He hurt his knee … he missed training for a week and a bit and then he had COVID as well. He hasn’t had any continuity, it was only last week he got back into full training.
“He needs to get in to play as many AFL games as he can for the rest of the year.”