ADELAIDE skipper Taylor Walker has failed to overcome his ankle injury and will miss Sunday's clash against Essendon at Adelaide Oval.

Walker arrived home in Adelaide from the club's loss to Geelong last weekend in a moon boot and was unable to train at all this week.

The good news, though, is that Crows coach Don Pyke expects the captain to line-up against the Brisbane Lions next week.

Pyke also dismissed the suggestion Walker was being rested, insisting he wanted every player in the best 22 playing whenever possible.

"That ankle's pulled up a bit sorer than we'd hoped … we hope it's only going to be a one-week thing," Pyke said.

"We've just backed him off now and he’ll probably start running later in the weekend to bring him up for next week.

"We weren’t really looking for an enforced rest for him, in an ideal world we want all our players - I've been saying all year that continuity is important.

"Not ideal he's not playing this week but as I said, hopefully we’ll get him back for next week."

Pyke said he could look at bringing in another forward from the SANFL like Harry Dear (who has booted 12 goals in his past four SANFL games) but that he also had scope to simply switch the line-up around and insert another midfielder or defender.

Defender Daniel Talia and midfielder Richard Douglas have both recovered from corkies and are set to play pivotal roles in what the club hopes will be a significant victory.

The Crows slipped from second to sixth on the AFL ladder after losing to the Cats; only percentage splits teams from second to seventh on the ladder.

Against a struggling Essendon outfit many see Sunday as a chance for the Crows to make up that valuable percentage.

Pyke refused to buy-in to such thinking and, after watching the Bombers last weekend, claimed they were a larger threat than their 37-point defeat to the Lions suggested.

"We're not in that headspace at all," he said.

"Last week wasn't the result we were after … the guys are pretty keen to atone for what was a performance that wasn't like us.

"We were beaten at the contest and we were beaten in tackles, our pressure around the ball wasn't to the standard we've had throughout the year.

"Essendon is certainly one of those teams that, although the results don't indicate it, they've been playing really well … they had 66 inside 50s last week, they had more scoring shots than their opponents the last three games.

"We take nothing lightly."