ADELAIDE chief executive Steven Trigg has revealed the club sacrificed an extra day's break in favour of a Friday night final to encourage fans to turn up.

Trigg has ordered Adelaide fans to show their support for the club by turning up to AAMI Stadium for the elimination final against Essendon and wants a capacity crowd of 50,000 at the stadium.

The Crows attracted a crowd of just 37,685 for last year’s home final against Collingwood and was heavily criticised about its ability to draw a big crowd.

“I’m a bit tired of being questioned by the AFL about our ability to get this ground full in big games like this. With previous crowds in the last two or three attempts being in the low-30, 000s [that criticism is hard to deny],” Trigg said on Monday.

“With the support that AFL football has in this city we don’t think it’s unreasonable to get well up into the 40,000s and, hopefully, a full house- that’s our target.”

Adelaide’s past three finals fixtures at AAMI Stadium have all been played on a Saturday afternoon.

Trigg said the club had pushed for a Friday night final rather than an extra day’s rest but denied it would have an impact on the outcome.

“It [the break between games] is the same for both sides. The input from the football department was that we’ll play anytime and anywhere,” Trigg said.

“We’re going to have some favouritism attached to us [this week]. That doesn’t mean much, but what does is performance helped by a really loud, full house here barracking for us on Friday night.”

Adelaide has contested eight of the past nine finals series, including the last five in succession, but has not made it past the preliminary final since the club’s premiership years of 1997 and 1998.

Trigg admitted there would be a “bit of heat on” his team to beat an undermanned Essendon on Friday night, but said the Crows were ready for the challenge.

“It’s not a club line about needing to front up to the fact that our finals record over the past few years hasn’t been as good as we liked. That’s Neil and the team accepting the situation and saying: ‘It’s not going to change, until we change it’.”