CROWS coach Neil Craig will resist shifting his stars back into their coveted midfield positions for next Saturday night’s NAB Cup decider against St Kilda at AAMI Stadium.

Adelaide has experimented with senior players Simon Goodwin, Tyson Edwards and Andrew McLeod in different roles during the pre-season and Craig says the same experimental approach will apply in the grand final.

“We’ll stay with the plan for the grand final, so that we can make good assessments at the end of next week. We pride ourselves on not changing, so once we make a plan we go with it,” Craig said after the 23-point semi-final win over Hawthorn.

“We still need to make sure we use the NAB Cup to finalise our preparation for round one, but we’ll be playing absolutely flat out with the team that we’ve got in the positions they’re in.”

Earlier in the week the Crows described the clash with Hawthorn’s talented midfield as a huge test, and on Saturday night Adelaide’s young onballers passed with flying colours.

Scott Thompson continued his stellar form with 29 touches and two goals, while up and coming stars Nathan van Berlo, Brad Symes, Chris Knights and Jason Porplyzia held their own against the likes of Sam Mitchell, Luke Hodge and Jordan Lewis.

“They’re [the younger midfielders] are in a learning phase and that’s why tonight’s game was so good because it was tight,” Craig said.

“Franklin kicks an unbelievable goal in the last quarter to bring the margin back to a point and our guys held firm. You can’t buy that experience.

“They did a great job there and so did the senior guys who had the capacity to play in different areas of the ground.”

Craig also praised his side’s improved pressure skills and enigmatic forward Brett Burton’s uninhibited performance.

“Brett’s got a special skill set that makes him very hard to match up on. He’s played a lot of footy in the midfield so he has good conditioning from a running point of view, plus his aerial skill, which you saw tonight,” Craig said.

“It’s important we manage Brett correctly [to prevent injury] and as I said before, if we can keep he, Andrew McLeod, Simon Goodwin and Tyson Edwards up in the forward line, hopefully we’ll cause some problems.”