1. Department of youth
Midway through the third term with the game in the balance, it was Adelaide's brigade of youth that sparked the team into resurgence. Patrick Dangerfield, Taylor Walker, Rory Sloane (all 22 years old) and Josh Jenkins (23) combined to kick four consecutive goals for the Crows to capture the lead after being down by as much as 21 points early in the term. Veteran Graham Johncock chipped in before Jenkins booted his second for the quarter, giving the Crows a vital six-point lead at the final change.

More Talking Points

2. Bombers join the club
With its loss to the Crows, Essendon remains in a desperate fight for seventh and eighth spot. The Bombers looked the side likely to take the vital win on Sunday night, until midway through the third term when the momentum well and truly swung Adelaide's way. A victory would have put the Bombers safely into seventh, a win clear of North Melbourne. The Bombers face an uphill battle to remain in the eight as they face North Melbourne next week, then Carlton, Richmond and Collingwood.

3. Porpoise down
Jason Porplyzia sent a huge scare through the Adelaide camp when, after warming up at half-time, he left the group early and headed straight down into the rooms. Porplyzia has had massive injury issues in the past and missed all but five minutes of the 2011 season after dislocating his right shoulder. It appeared his dodgy right shoulder was again the problem as he was subbed out of the game just after the main break.

4. More tissue issues for Dons
Essendon's soft tissue curse continued on Sunday night in Adelaide, with Bombers Ben Howlett and Jason Winderlich both suffering hamstring injuries.
Howlett was subbed out in the first term and, midway through the third term, 100-gamer Winderlich also went down. Prior to Sunday's match it was reported the Bombers had suffered as many as 25 soft tissue injuries this season and are currently missing reigning best and fairest David Zaharakis, Patrick Ryder, Brent Stanton, Stewart Crameri, Kyle Reimers and Michael Hibberd. Courtenay Dempsey, David Hille, Angus Monfries and Michael Hurley have also experienced issues in 2012.

5. Banner bombed
Essendon may have got off to a flyer on Sunday afternoon, but there certainly wouldn't have been any inspiration from their banner. With Winderlich and Watson celebrating milestone games, the Bombers' banner attempted to pay homage to their careers via the beauty of special gold crepe paper. But moments before the team ran out onto the ground the rain thundered down and the banner seemed to almost melt away. With basically all the paper gone, the players were instead forced to run through the banner's sticky-tape skeleton.

The views in this article are those of the author and not necessarily those of the AFL or its clubs