ADELAIDE'S veteran defender Michael Doughty says his side has an advantage over St Kilda ahead of Friday night's encounter, with the Saints coming off a six-day break compared to the Crows' 13.

He said just one extra day to recover can prove a big difference, let alone the extra week Adelaide enjoys after its bye last week .

"It's a challenge, an extra day's recovery does help the other team," he said of six-day breaks.

"The team that can recover quicker and get set for the next game obviously has the advantage."

But Doughty said the argument that coming off a bye gave his side an advantage was complicated by St Kilda's form.
 
The Saints thrashed Gold Coast last weekend by 95 points and will enter Friday night's encounter full of confidence.

"It's a hard one to measure; obviously they've been up on the Gold Coast and they've played a very good game of footy up there," Doughty said.

"They'll be coming here confident, so the confidence factor versus us having a week off - it's line ball isn't it?"

Doughty said he would still prefer to be in Adelaide's boots, but the Crows' form after having a week off hasn't been encouraging.

Of the last four games it has played after a break, Adelaide is 2-2, but Doughty said the team was well prepared for the Saints.

"Previously we haven't come off them too well, but I think we've done it as best we possibly could," he said.

"We had a great main session this week, the boys are up and about, freshened up, so I'd expect us to come out firing this week.

While the Crows are sitting pretty in fifth spot with a game in hand at the halfway mark of the season, Doughty insisted there was still work to be done.

He labeled Adelaide's efforts so far as "a starting point" and said the side had to work on its consistency in the lead up to finals.

"This group's pretty determined to keep improving throughout the rest of the year," he said.

"The last few weeks we've had one bad quarter and they have kicked goals against us, so I think it's just making sure that if we're not scoring, we're not bleeding goals as well.

"That's probably our next level."

Harry Thring covers Adelaide news for AFL.com.au. Follow him on Twitter: @AFL.com.au.