ADELAIDE coach Matthew Nicks is keeping his cards close to his chest as he prepares to dull the influence of a red-hot Nick Daicos in Saturday night's clash with Collingwood.

The Magpies superstar dismantled St Kilda with 41 disposals, seven marks and four clearances at the weekend, and will again be a pivotal figure as last year's minor premiers open their 2026 campaign.

Nicks said the Crows had enormous respect for Daicos but remained coy on what plans he would employ to keep the three-time All-Australian under wraps.

"We'll hold on to that one and that could change mid-game to be honest," Nicks told reporters on Wednesday.

"I saw (Isaac) Quaynor describe him as a teleporter - he's a fantastic player, and there's a lot of opinions around tagging, and what you should or shouldn't do.

"There's certain players who are very, very hard to tag - especially someone who can teleport.

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"He's got elite speed, elite endurance - it's hard to lock down just one player, so there's a system that can look after that and then there's the other option of 'have you got a player who can do it (tag)?'

"We might look at both, we'll see how the game pans out."

Former Sydney ruck Lachlan McAndrew is favoured to win a club debut ahead of Reilly O'Brien.

McAndrew, who played two games for the Swans in 2023, was given first crack at leading the line in the pre-season after rule changes disadvantaged O'Brien.

Lachlan McAndrew poses for a photo during Adelaide's official team photo day on February 17, 2026. Picture: AFL Photos

O'Brien was renowned as a grappling style of ruckman, which is now outlawed at centre bounces.

"Rob (O'Brien) has been challenged this year with a rule change - and it's a big one, it's a huge rule change," Nicks said.

"Talking with Rob ... he hadn't practised the run and jump for a long time, for a number of years. As a lot of rucks had, they worked on a different craft.

"We've seen him transform that in a really short period of time ... don't write Rob off at all.

"But in the same breath, Lachie, he's unique that he's 210 (tall), he's got a big jump on him, so from a centre-bounce point of view, he's in a good position." 

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Key forward Riley Thilthorpe is expected to be fit after missing Adelaide's last pre-season game against Fremantle in Western Australia because of a back complaint.

"He's in a good space at the moment," Nicks said.

"We'll train today and get a last look at, a feeling, on how he's going.

"Digging down into that one a little more, it just wasn't worth us risking Riley, it just didn't make sense to play him in a practice match.

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"We can get the work into him through training - yes, it's not the bash-and-crash and change of direction that you get in a game scenario.

"But we got enough work into him that we're confident he'll get through a session today and be right to play."

Midfielder Jake Soligo was pushing to play after having a procedure to correct an irregular heartbeat.

The 23-year-old played just one half of football in Adelaide's pre-season trial games.