Adelaide Crows coach Brenton Sanderson says club great Graham Johncock still has crucial role to play this season Graham Johncock in the thick of it for Port Adelaide against Norwood on Saturday. THE AFL career of Adelaide's oldest player, Graham Johncock, is not over with Adelaide coach Brenton Sanderson declaring him a crucial part of the Crows' bid to play finals. Johncock is pushing to return to the side to play Gold Coast in a fortnight after consecutive impressive performances for Port Adelaide in the SANFL. Last week he kicked six goals in Port's win over South Adelaide and on Saturday he kicked the winning goal in the shock victory over Norwood at Alberton. The 30-year-old has only played two AFL games this season and has not been in a Crows jumper since the Round 3 Showdown loss to Port Adelaide. Sanderson had said Johncock's form did not warrant selection in recent weeks. Now having answered that challenge of form in the SANFL, Johncock's physical condition is not up to AFL standard, Sanderson said. It has hindered Johncock's ability to maintain the required intensity for four quarters - a reflection of his wider team which struggled to match Richmond when the game was on the line in the first half on Saturday. But Sanderson is adamant Johncock is "in the mix" and his cards have not been marked at West Lakes. "He's getting his body back to a level as a 30-year-old where he can play at this intensity for 120 minutes," Sanderson said. He wasn't in the shape early in the season to do that, but he's starting to get back. He's training really hard, he's kicking goals in the SANFL and he's going to become a really important player for us in the second half of the year. Johncock has been reinvented as a forward in recent years and that appears to be his only way back into the side with the likes of Rory Laird, Luke Brown, Brodie Smith, Matthew Jaensch and Brodie Martin assuming the small defender roles. But Sanderson said Johncock's career was "certainly not" over. "Graham has been a legend of our footy club, he's been our best small defender over the club's history," he said. We probably see him more as a small, opportunist forward now as we're putting games into Brown and Laird and Smith in defence. But I think Graham has a role to play for us in the second half of the year and I'm sure when he comes back he'll give us some of that experience that we're lacking at the moment. But he's just got to get his body to a position where he can sustain 120 minutes of footy. Johncock and Ian Callinan are the only Crows who turn 31 this year while Brent Reilly, Ben Rutten and Scott Thompson will all follow next year.