ADELAIDE coach Neil Craig believes the latest fad in AFL strategy - extended defensive zones - will mean slower play in 2009.

Earlier this season Hawthorn, under coach Alastair Clarkson, was lauded for its ‘cluster’ or 18-man ‘rolling’ zone and Craig suggested that similar set ups would become commonplace next year.

“My prediction for next year is that you’re going to see a lot of slow football. A lot of slow football because I think defence is now getting better developed and more sophisticated,” Craig said on Friday, in the week after his club were was bundled out of the finals by Collingwood.

“My prediction may be wrong but we had flooding and, now, what we’re seeing is zoning pretty much all over the field - not just in the back 50m.

“You saw some of our play against Collingwood on the weekend and you saw the Hawthorn and Western Bulldogs game. The Bulldogs, nearly the most attacking side in the competition, at one stage looked like they weren’t going to score against Hawthorn.

“If you go back and look at Hawthorn when they played Geelong, there were two high scoring teams that struggled to get through each other, and that defence is going to get better.

“It will be the sides that get good at doing it themselves and that start to work it out [that will succeed] and I think there could be a lot of frustration next year for all supporter groups.”

The Crows are regarded as one of the best defensive teams in the competition, but Craig conceded there were times this season his players struggled to penetrate the opposition’s defence.

“We were able to handle some style of play and play well against some set-ups, but there were others that we got stifled against,” he said.

“I’m a great believer that you still have to attack [to win AFL games].

"Clearly, we can’t disregard our forward system in general, but we need to think of ways to be able to handle the zone that’s coming into our game.”