Former Adelaide captain Mark Bickley sees no reason why Tom Doedee would up and leave the Crows.
The defender was overlooked for the captaincy which changed hands from Rory Sloane to Jordan Dawson last weekend.
Many were forecasting Doedee as Sloane’s natural replacement but the club opted for second-year Crow Dawson instead.
Immediately after the appointment, it was floated that list managers from Victorian clubs would be lining up to lure Doedee home as he comes out of contract this year.
However, two-time flag-winning skipper Bickley doesn’t necessarily believe a decision like this would force the key defender out of the club.
“I think he would have been disappointed, but that’s fine,” Bickley said on SEN SA Breakfast.
“You’re allowed to be disappointed if something doesn’t go your way, but at the same time, we look back in history and a similar thing happened when Taylor Walker was made captain and Rory Sloane was overlooked.
“Everyone was like, ‘Ah well, Rory’s gone, he’ll be a free agent soon and he’ll head home’. But it didn’t happen because it was about the quality of the person and he still he had unfinished business here.
“So it will all come down to that with Tom. Where does he see the future of the footy club? You’ve got to remember he’s invested about seven years of his life here in Adelaide. He’s settled, he’s bought a house, he’s renovating, he’s doing all the stuff young men do.”
Bickley says it is no “fait accompli” that Doedee would leave even if the decision was met with a degree of disappointment.
He feels the hard yards the 25-year-old has put in with the Crows would make a “compelling case” for him to remain, especially if the team performs well in 2023.
“I don’t think it’s a fait accompli (that), ‘Oh, I didn’t get the captaincy, I’m going back to Melbourne’,” he added.
“I would think that the way Adelaide performs this year, the way Tom performs, the future of the club, the young group that’s coming through (will have an influence on his decision).
“If they play really good footy and they develop and they’re moving closer towards finals or playing finals, I think that would be a compelling case for him to stick around and enjoy the fruits of five tough years.
“He wasn’t in the team in 2017, he didn’t enjoy that extended period of relative success. He’s had to grind through the hard years. So I would think he would be reluctant to leave if Adelaide are pushing in the right direction.”
Dawson himself insists that there is no ill-feeling from Doedee or rift between the pair after the ex-Swan was installed as skipper.
“He’s not disappointed at all, he’s absolutely pumped for me,” Dawson said on SEN’s Sportsday.
“One thing that we have in the leadership group at Adelaide is we have a lot of diverse players. Sloaney touched on it in his presser that there were a number of us willing and able to step up if and when Sloaney was to call time.
“He (Doedee) is still a crucial part of the leadership group and I’ll be bouncing ideas and leaning on him throughout the year, no doubt.”
Dawson is just the ninth full-time captain of the Adelaide Football Club, following Chris McDermott, Tony McGuiness, Bickley, Mark Ricciuto, Simon Goodwin, Nathan Van Berlo, Taylor Walker and Sloane.