Adelaide's dual premiership captain Mark Bickley believes Trent Hentschel has the capacity to kick 50 goals in 2009 despite missing the past two AFL seasons with injury.
Bickley, who is one of the Crows' new midfield coaches, said the centre half forward has shown enough in the pre-season to suggest his comeback at West Lakes will be a strong one.
The 26-year-old, who hasn't played in the Adelaide guernsey since he wrecked his knee in a 2006 Showdown, took part in the club's running session on Monday and was only seconds away from notching a personal best in a three-kilometre time trial.
Bickley said Hentschel looked 'fantastic' and had the hunger to succeed at the top level again.
"I think he's always had the determination to get back there. I don't think you can go through the two years rehab that he's done without that determination," Bickley said.
"But what I've sensed this year is that is his body is capable of doing that, I think in the past couple of years anecdotally it's let him down at various stages."
"So all things are pointing to a good start to the year for Trent Hentschel."
Bickley said some of the team's other high profile players were also impressive with their running in the team's first formal session after Christmas.
"(Nathan) van Berlo was a standout - I think he ran a club record time this morning, I think 9.29 for three kilometres is outstanding. But I'll also mention some of the guys from the leadership group, Tyson Edwards has played for probably 13 or 14 years and ran a personal best time," he said.
"I think that shows that everyone from the club, that the blokes at the end of their careers, or in the veteran stage, are still really serious about what they are doing and are really keen to keep improving."
"Most of the players had to do something every second day so we call it a break but it's more of a break from travelling down (to AAMI Stadium) and being in the routine of training, it's not really a break from training as such."
Bickley, who has spent the past five years working in various forms of the media, said his time out of the game had been valuable.
The 39-year-old said he was watching a minimum of four games a weekend last season and had been able to watch the Crows' progress from the outer and with objectivity.
However the former Channel Nine and Triple M employee said he wouldn't be following in Michael Voss' footsteps and jumping into a senior coaching role just yet.
"I don't have any illusions it's going to happen in the short term, there's so much to learn and I think I've got a long way to go before I even entertain that thought," he said.
"At some stage I thought that I may go back to coaching and as the time rolled on, and you've been out of it a bit longer, you probably have to make a decision if you are going to go back into it, it probably had to be sooner rather than later."