ADELAIDE coach Brenton Sanderson admits his young side was overawed in Saturday's qualifying final, but would benefit from the finals experience in next Friday night's semi final.

The Crows gave nine players their AFL finals debut on Saturday, as opposed to the Sydney Swans, with just Mitch Morton playing his first final.

Crows assistant coach Dean Bailey said earlier in the week that the side's inexperience could work in its favour and offer it "unbridled enthusiasm", but the reality was vastly different.

Adelaide uncharacteristically fumbled the ball, dropped marks and often made poor decisions when in possession.

Sanderson conceded the situation got to many of his players.

"In offence it looked like we were just panicking, didn't have the calmness, the poise just to lower our eyes or lower our vision and hit the free target," Sanderson said.

"Maybe the anxiety of the event [got to us], I know some players sort of thrived on it, maybe others felt like there was a bit of perceived pressure."

But while they were soundly beaten, Sanderson said his players needed to look at the defeat in a positive light.

"They've got to make sure they learn from that [loss]," he said.

"It's the big stage now, they would have got a good taste for it and hopefully they don't look upon the experience as a negative one.

"We're not done with yet, we've got plenty of fight left in us."

Sanderson criticised Adelaide's attacking entry as well as its use of the ball when within scoring range.

The Crows missed numerous scoring opportunities while the Swans nailed theirs, proven by the contrasting score, 5.12 to 11.5.

"We just kept jamming it sort of high half-forward which plays into Sydney's hands and they just made the most of their opportunities going forward," he said.

"They only had 30-something inside 50s, 37 I think inside 50s and they kicked 11 goals which was the difference I guess."

Several of Adelaide's midfield stars failed to fire on Saturday, with the usually damaging Patrick Dangerfield, Richard Douglas, Matthew Wright and Nathan van Berlo all severely restricted.

On the other side of the equation, Swans Josh Kennedy (35 disposals, 10 clearances, one goal), Ryan O'Keefe (37 disposals, nine clearances) and Adam Goodes (22 touches, three goals, seven inside 50s) all stamped their authority.

Sanderson said it was "unusual" to be so soundly beaten in the midfield, but that his players were "taught a lesson".

"Head to head they probably got the better of us which is unusual for us because it's an area of huge strength for us all season," he said.

"They play a way that stands up in finals and its not too dissimilar to what we're trying to do but we probably got taught a bit of a lesson in how to play finals footy today.

"But to lose clearances, to lose contested ball, to get out-tackled, it's just not the Adelaide way."

Harry Thring is a reporter for AFL Media. Follow him on Twitter: @AFL_Harry