ADELAIDE coach Neil Craig believes he’s been guilty of sending a ‘subliminal’ message to his playing group this season, which could have contributed to the club’s disappointing 31-point loss to Collingwood on Saturday.

The Crows have already begun soul searching after a second consecutive elimination final defeat and a frank Craig identified a so-called “destination disease” as a possible cause for both of the losses.

From the outset of the season, Adelaide’s goal was just to make the top eight and Craig suggested that, perhaps, the group had deemed it had already achieved its aim ahead of last weekend’s home final.

“If you look at what our club and I, in particular, talk about, it [this year] was about list development, it was about being fiercely competitive and, if you stop there, you could say, ‘well the Crows have covered that off to a tee’,” Craig told Radio 5AA.

“That’s sort of been my message and, in reflection, after the Collingwood game and when you bring in the Hawthorn game [2007 elimination final] - because in both of those games we were up at half time and I think we could have won them - I think I’ve been guilty of sending a subliminal message to our playing group that, maybe, just getting there [finals] is good enough.

“So, I need to address that and address it quickly and strongly. Call it ‘destination disease’, call it what you like, but clearly that’s one thing I believe I’ve made an error in - not a deliberate error - but an error in the message I’ve been giving to the group.”

The Crows are regarded as one of the fittest, most competitive and professional outfits in the AFL, but Craig said the club would need to be even more demanding of its players if it was to develop from an also-ran into a genuine premiership contender.

“Internally, we talk about the importance of finals, but upon reflection, I don’t think I’ve put enough real emphasis on that [winning a premiership],” Craig said.

“Maybe, I’ve got caught up in the destination disease as well, you know, where finishing in the top eight is where it stops. I don’t come out and directly say that to the group because our whole message coming up to finals is different to that.

“We haven’t been blown away in finals. Our average losing score is 14 points and out of the five finals that we’ve lost, we’ve been in front at half time in most of them.

“To get to those levels, we’ve been really demanding on the group and I think we need to be more demanding again.”

Craig said the realisation had come from just ‘looking at the facts’ surrounding the club’s last two ‘winnable’ elimination final losses.

“We weren’t playing Geelong or Hawthorn on Saturday,” Craig said.

“A year ago, we played Hawthorn and I thought we were in a great position. In actual fact, we only had to hold the ball for another 20 seconds and we would’ve moved on.

“The two sides that played at AAMI Stadium on the weekend, I don’t think there was much difference on paper. We had a home ground advantage and apart from our second quarter, where our supporters would have said, ‘that’s the Adelaide we expected’, we have to put our hand up and say the other three weren’t good enough.

“You can live in denial or you can look at the hard facts of it. I need to make sure I don’t jump at shadows, but I believe that [my message] is one aspect of it.”