The Mighty Crows

Sooner or later they'll get some of last night's match up and woo-hoo, won't we be happy? 55,000 packed the stadium to capacity (which has been known to carry 67,000 before the seating for all revamp), and did that crowd go off!! Did you hear us? Adelaide had lift off and it was brilliant. Those who didn't go organised dinners and TVs or dinners and a good pub and the whole city just lifted off and ran with the excitement. I am not a football fantatic: I know little about the football, but even I enjoyed the match and even those who didn't follow it really wanted to know the score and the details. Everyone was so excited. It was amazing. The Crows came on and kicked 5 points instead of 5 goals and people were wondering. Port has never been a team that cannot come back hard. But for a non footie follower there was a distinctive turning point...when Pickett flattened Biglands and he went out cold and was carried off the field. Later on some other Crow went out cold too, but I have no idea how. Well, when Biglands was flattened everyone went off and the energy levels surged. Surprisingly, players controlled themselves well because they must have been so pumped up and so on edge. The umpire, as I see it, should have got the ball back into play. The guys were out there to play football and lecturing them ..yap yap yap, really didn't seem the thing to do with all that energy with no place to go. From then on , the match turned. It was amazingly exciting and there was some fantastic football. Port took control of the ruck because Biglands wasn't there, but , he'd been flattened by Pickett and you sensed the unease on the Port side. This was a home crowd. Port has some great players and the couple of young ones are going to be fantastic in a couple of years, but the Crows just powered on. For the first time I understood what all the fuss about Ricciuto was. He is in a league of his own. The way he holds a ball and holds himself, the way he kicks, the way he is very keen to get everyone in his team into the match. I could just see how talented he was and it's that way of making things look so easy and fluid that shows an expert.The Crows just cruised it in and beat Port by a huge margin. That has had us puzzling. We know Port. We know they can come back big time. We know they never give up. They hadn't given up. They were not playing badly either. But from the time of the Biglands knock out there was an electric shock and the dynamics changed. The Crows played brillaintly, like they can and Port played well. I do not think they can be accused of playing badly. So, now we are going to be full of it ready for next week. As Neil Craig said, tonight has given the Crows a chance to play in the semi finals. He just cuts through all the crap, Neil.