Crows joint-vice captain Patrick Dangerfield says he’s keen to atone for a “poor” Showdown performance against the Sydney Swans at Adelaide Oval on Saturday.
Dangerfield was below his brilliant best in Adelaide’s loss to Port Adelaide, finishing with 17 possessions. Coach Brenton Sanderson declared only “seven or eight” Crows could hold their heads high following the defeat. A frank Dangerfield admitted he wasn’t one of them.
“We had some fantastic contributors through our midfield. Sloaney was outstanding and Richard Douglas coming off one month without footy was also outstanding … and then we had some really poor efforts, and I thought mine was certainly one of those poor efforts. I was very fumbly around the ball all day,” Dangerfield said.
“In terms of too few players carrying the load; that was definitely true. We had probably eight really good players on the weekend and the gap between those players and the rest of us was far too great. You can’t afford to have that against good sides.
“There were some players who didn’t have their best day and I was one of them.”
Dangerfield lamented Adelaide’s poor decision making and ball use, which led to 16 of the Power’s 19 goals on the weekend.
“Some of our decisions forward of the play were off. We needed some composure to go back and take the set shot, or take an extra second before deciding what to do with the ball … (our inability to do) that results in 16 goals from turnovers,” he said.
““We fought really hard to get back in the game, which was a positive sign, but after we hit the lead we didn’t kick two goals in a row. We weren’t able to keep scoreboard pressure on the opposition and that’s the most important pressure act of all.
“It was certainly a disappointing result for us. Anytime you lose by 50-plus points, it’s not good enough and not the way we wanted to respond after last week’s performance.”
Result aside, Dangerfield said the atmosphere at the Adelaide Oval was “fantastic”.
“It’s pretty special with the hill there, The Cathedral in the back and the way the stands are set up, it really just feels like the crowd is on top of you and it’s a lot noisier, which we enjoy as players,” he said.
“We’re looking forward to having our home game there against Sydney this weekend and to responding.”
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