Adelaide coach Brenton Sanderson praised his injury-hit team’s ability to fight out Saturday’s twilight clash at the MCG, but said the final result was an accurate reflection of Carlton’s dominance.

The Blues kicked five of the first six goals of the game to streak to a 28-point lead at quarter time. For the Crows, the score line was compounded by injuries to key forward Taylor Walker (knee) and small defender Luke Brown (concussion).

Despite being reduced to two players on the interchange bench from early in the second quarter, Adelaide rallied to cut the deficit from seven goals at three-quarter time to 17 points halfway through the final quarter.

But a third goal to livewire Chris Yarran snuffed out any hope of an unlikely Crows win, and the Blues ran out 32-point victors.

“Nothing much went right for us today, unfortunately. It did seem as though the writing was on the wall before we had the injuries, though,” Sanderson said after the game.

“I feel really disappointed for this playing group. They fought it out until the end, but we gave Carlton a five-goal head start – the final margin was about five goals.

“We tried our best to rotate as much as we could, but Carlton’s speed got us. They had more uncontested possessions, handball receives and 100 more possessions overall.

“We made fundamental errors and got beaten inside the contest as well. If a few things had gone our way late we might have pinched a win, but Carlton was the better side.”

The Crows were forced to restructure their forward line following the injury to Walker, which saw him substituted out of the game late in the first quarter. Regular defenders Andy Otten, Ben Rutten and Matthew Jaensch switched ends to good effect, with Otten and Jaensch kicking three goals each from nine scoring opportunities combined.

At the other end, Yarran (three goals) and Jeff Garlett (four goals) wreaked havoc. Sanderson said the Adelaide defenders didn’t receive enough support from teammates up the ground.

“We gave their small forwards too much space at times. Garlett and Yarran both bobbing up … it’s what we didn’t want,” Sanderson said.

“Rory Laird tried his heart out after being subbed in, but we gave up 64 inside 50ms. We’re not getting it done at the moment and we’re putting our defenders under too much pressure.

“A few of our defenders went forward and we threw the side around. We tried Rutten, Otten and Jaensch forward and they kicked six goals between them, so they kept trying as hard as they could but we’re not getting it done where it counts.”