Last week’s win over Essendon was a really consistent effort from all the boys. We were faced with some different strategies from the Bombers but we certainly adapted to them well and came out on top. It was interesting that Heath Hocking went to Dan Hannebery, which we had prepared for, but you never know what’s going to happen until game day. Hanners has had a couple of tags now, which meant it left Josh Kennedy free, so it was a different mix from what we normally attract from opposition teams. The tags usually go to our inside players, but our guys prepared well and the longer the game went, the better Hanners got and it was a good learning game for him.

With Hanners playing a different role and going more inside and Jarrad McVeigh taking on a role in defence, Benny McGlynn, Craig Bird and even Goodesy spent more time on the wing. It is really good that we have a lot of different players that can go through the midfield playing inside or the outside roles and last week against the Bombers it really worked for us. To top it off, our work rate was there, so it was really pleasing to get a good win over a quality side. It was also great to post such a big win over a team with a midfield like Essendon has.

Looking ahead to tomorrow afternoon’s match at AAMI Stadium, we’re going to be faced with another challenge because Adelaide have a really strong midfield who have the ability to spread really hard and make good decisions about when to run and where to run to.

The Adelaide mids will also be tough to match up on because they’ve got some strong players and some really good endurance athletes who can just run all day and they’re good decision makers and good ball users.

Patrick Dangerfield is clearly one of the Crows most important players, and he will play his 100th game this week. We need to stop his influence and we can’t just let him get the ball and run and carry. He’s also spending a little bit more time forward now, and he’s a great player, so the whole team will need to be on their game to stop him, but he’s not the only danger there. Their other midfielders like Richard Douglas, Rory Sloane and Scott Thompson are all really good players, so we need to take care of them as well.

The reason that the Crows have won three of their last four is because their midfield has been up and going, so it’s going to be a really good battle and we really need to start well in the midfield group especially over at AAMI Stadium, because when they’ve got the crowd on their side they’re a hard team to beat.

With just one week until our mid-season break, a win tomorrow would be terrific. We’ve been playing some pretty good footy and we just want to continue that. We’ve been working on a few things and it would top off a good start to the year if we can get a win over the Crows.