ADELAIDE says there is no reason to panic about the contract status of star midfield duo Patrick Dangerfield and Rory Sloane.

The pair fall out of contract at the end of this season, with Dangerfield qualifying for free agency and being strongly linked to a move to Geelong. 

Sloane has spoken more confidently about staying long-term at the club, and Crows football manager David Noble said the Crows were comfortable with where discussions were placed with both players.

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"We are in constant dialogue with Rory's manager and with Paddy's, and we're very comfortable with where we are at with both of those guys at the moment," Noble told Crocmedia.

"We don't see that there's necessarily anything to panic about, we're really comfortable, in that we've got a bunch of other guys coming out of contract as well."

Noble said the varying positions of Sloane and Dangerfield – one being a restricted free agent and the other simply out of contract – meant the messages coming from their management groups had "a slightly different connotation". 

Dangerfield is managed by Paul Connors, while Ned Guy of McDonald Sports is Sloane's manager.

The Crows have another handful of players who will become free agents at the end of the season, with AFL.com.au last week listing Richard Douglas, Andy Otten, Brent Reilly, Scott Thompson and Brodie Martin as being eligible.

"We're at a point where we think we've done some really hard yards and we want to work really closely with the players collectively to make sure that we've got this group staying together for as long as we possibly can," Noble said.

"That's really important that the group stays together and we add the bits on that we think we need to [over] the next year or two." 

This is the fourth season of free agency, and Noble said he always believed it would take about five years before the landmark player movement rules began to have a familiar strategy among clubs.

He said clubs would soon look to trade players out of their clubs before they qualified for free agency in order maximise their compensation, and said the Crows were always searching for players wanting to return home to South Australia. 

"Free agency will force clubs to look earlier, re-contract earlier and be more bullish about trying to trying to perhaps shift and move players earlier than what we might have in the past," Noble said.

"I think it's another year or two away from coming to fruition but we're always interested in getting ex-pat South Australians back, there's no doubt about that."