Adelaide Crows vs Hawthorn Hawks: Sam Mitchell has his side back into a preliminary final to take on the Geelong Cats. Josh Weddle speaks about him, Jai Newcombe and Jack Gunston shine

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Adelaide: It may have been a boring movie for the neutral, but the Hollywood Hawks hit the Crows like a cyclone on Friday night.

And there were Academy Award winners everywhere you looked.

Jai Newcombe, the man the entire competition overlooked for so long, was devastatingly good in the middle of the ground. The only midfielder who may have played a better game was Josh Ward, who the coach thought played the best game of his life.

The evergreen Jack Gunston wound back the clock with five big goals.

And captain James Sicily put in another workman-like shift, in a supporting role alongside big-boy recruits Tom Barrass and Josh Battle.

And then there’s Josh Weddle – the 191-centimetre defender-wingman who may just be the most important of them all. He’s fast, he’s agile, he can