I remember a game two years ago where we got smashed, but I have some great memories from my days at Essendon, in 1999 and 2000.

The ground itself is a bit bigger than the MCG, and it's a bit longer, not so much wider. It's a bit like Subiaco. Outside of that, every team has its home ground and they play their little idiosyncrasies better than the others teams do.

As far as the supporters are concerned, to be honest, when you've played a few games, you don't hear them and you focus on the game and the ball and what is happening instead.

You might hear them when you kick a few goals or when you run out, but apart from that, you wouldn't think the crowd plays a major factor. I'm sure everybody is different though.

The Crows are a very good team. They've been at the forefront of the competition for the last few years, and they're always a very hard prospect to come up against, especially over in Adelaide.

We'll have to play really well to beat them. They're a very well-structured team, and they are very good defensively and they score well going forward.

They've pretty much got all sides of the game covered at the moment. We have to make sure we really perform well, and make sure we stick to our game plan.

The Crows' real danger players are obviously the players who have played 200, 250 games. Simon Goodwin and Tyson Edwards and those types of players who have been around for a long time and have really proven themselves that we need to watch.

We also better look out for Brett Burton, who's a real danger if he plays, but pretty much with the way the Crows play – as a team – they don't rely on any "names" to win the game for them.

It's more of a team effort, which is one of their real strengths.

So far this year, we've been going well in most games. Against West Coast, we were close to winning, and also against Port Adelaide. We've played pretty well for the whole year, but certainly there have been patches where we haven't played too well.

Over the last five games, we've played some pretty reasonable teams and we're 3-2, so if we play at somewhat near our best, we should be OK.

It was encouraging to play well against the Eagles in Perth. We've played well in Melbourne in the last couple of years against West Coast, but it's a daunting task to go across to Perth and play good footy.

Playing well against a side that has played in the past two Grand Finals in a row with a relatively young team provides a bit of confidence for the rest of the season.

We've played four first-gamers already, with Daniel Nicholls, Shannon Cox, Alan Toovey and Brad Dick, and if you look back to last year with Scott Pendlebury and Dale Thomas, there's six players who have played just a handful of games.

There's also a few others who haven't played a lot of games, like Harry O'Brien and Heath Shaw. That's eight out of the team, so we are a very young side.

There's also been a few good performances in the reserves. Chris Egan played a great game last week, and at the same time, Sharrod Wellingham has been playing really well and Tyson Goldsack has been playing well after an injury-interrupted pre-season.

Ben Reid had a couple of games in the pre-season in the seniors and is getting better and better each week. We have got quite a few players who can come back – Paul Medhurst won't be far away, Paul Licuria might be one or two weeks away, and Brodie Holland is back next week.

We had match committee before, and depending on what happens throughout the week with training and injuries, there's certainly a few blokes – young and old - who might put up their hands.

The nine-day break for us is going to help. We're going to be fresher, but I remember back to 1999 when I was playing for Essendon and we had a week off in the finals.

We came back and played a shocking first quarter in the preliminary final, which probably cost us the game. It can go both ways, but I'm sure we'll be ready to go.

Last week was all about recovery and we stayed right away from the track. This week, the boys had the weekend off and then were back into things yesterday. We'll continue to train this week, go over to Adelaide on Friday afternoon, and hopefully be ready by Saturday night.

I possibly have an edge as an assistant coach having played so recently, as sometimes I have a more-intimate knowledge of opponents our players might play on.

We have opposition coaches as well, who look at all the players from across the competition, and they have a fairly good knowledge of most players. My knowledge of some players can come in handy.

I got involved with coaching last year after I found out I couldn't play anymore, and I do enjoy it. So why have time off?

I do miss playing occasionally. There are games here and there, especially the big games … I would love to have played on Anzac Day last week. The days like that I think I'll miss playing for a long time.

But if you can't play in big games, you can't play finals either. That's the thing that's really going to hurt me the most, if we make the finals.

I'm really enjoying my role in coaching though, especially as I've always enjoyed the tactical side of the game, and I also enjoy winning.

It's the next best thing to playing, and I'd still like to be playing of course, but unfortunately, I can't. I can still do my best to help the team out though.