ADELAIDE coach Matthew Nicks says star Crow Izak Rankine is "incredibly hungry" to return and repay the club after the homophobic slur that ended his season last year on the eve of the finals.

It comes as the Adelaide coach defended his midfield group amid "noise" it wasn't able to match it with the best in the competition.  

Rankine was hit with a four-game suspension for what he later described as his 'hurtful' remark towards Collingwood opponent Isaac Quaynor in round 23 last year, seeing him ruled out for the Crows' qualifying and semi-final losses as they crashed out of September.

The former Sun picked up a minor hamstring injury this week and will sit out the Crows' practice matches, but is still on track to be ready to return in round two once serving the final game of his ban in round one. Nicks said the 25-year-old and the group had moved on whilst supporting their player.

"The whole club's got around Izak, Izak's got around the whole club. Missing out the way he did, it's made him incredibly hungry to get back and play footy again," Nicks told AFL.com.au.

"I feel for him a bit. He's not going to play round one as it sits and he's still got a little bit to see out. Izak's taken his focus to another level.

"There was a piece of it where he felt there was a little bit of responsibility for his team that he didn't want to let his team down and at the same time it was a really hard one to get your head around the way it played out.

"Our group's done a fantastic job of being able to say, 'OK, this has happened, we move on and now we're in the moment' and the next moment for him will hopefully be, everything going well, round two and we'll welcome him back in."

Rankine kicked 31 goals from 22 games last season, whilst recording a career-best four clearances a game with more time in the midfield to be named in the All-Australian squad. His absence in the Crows' pair of finals defeats was costly, with Nicks saying the matchwinner remained a key part of his on-ball plans.

"What I've noticed this year with Izak is he's invested so much more in team. He's always been a team player, but just his want to learn and understand the game plan even more [has grown]," he said.

"Almost to a point where he and I have had chats around 'We've taken this to the level, maybe we need to pull it back a little' and maybe we need a little more time for Izak to just enjoy your time away from footy. That's a great space to be in as a coach."

Rankine and Josh Rachele will again be pivotal in the Crows' midfield mix, with Nicks comparing the burst qualities of Rachele to two of the modern greats.

"Josh is a power athlete. He's speed and power. He plays his best footy in that style. We want to get him in there and then give him a spell then get him back in there," Nicks said.

"There's been a lot of really strong players in that similar mould over time that have been the best in the league, I think of Dusty Martin and Christian Petracca and these sort of players."

The Crows had a dip for Western Bulldogs midfielder Ryley Sanders in last year's trade period but he didn't move, with Nicks backing his midfield group against the league's best.

"A lot of the noise is we don't have the midfield that's going to do it. And that's OK, I respect and understand those opinions. But midfield is not all stoppage and there might be a misconception that clearance numbers and stoppage numbers are really important," Nicks said.

"I'm not saying they're not, but there's a lot more important areas in the game.

"We know what our KPIs are and [if] we're losing clearance on a day because we don’t have a big bodied inside midfielder, or we don't necessarily have the connection from ruck to mids that you might want in comparison to Gold Coast, well then we better be winning the other part of the game. And last year we showed that we were.

"We've got a lot of things that we rate highly with our midfield group. One of the keys to that is the way they transition. They work rate they have both ways. We've got a really disciplined group that understand team and they're all in."  

Subscribe to the Your Coach podcast to listen to Cal Twomey's full interview with Adelaide coach Matthew Nicks in coming days.