Adelaide stalwart Scott Thompson has sung the praises of highly-rated teenager Brad Crouch ahead of his possible AFL debut this week.

The 19-year-old Crouch is in the selection frame at Adelaide for their away fixture against Brisbane on Saturday.

And Thompson hopes to have the precociously talented midfielder as a teammate “real soon”.

Crouch was signed by the Crows in 2011 but was unable to play AFL last season due to his age.

But the North Ballarat onballer is winning rave reviews from the likes of Thompson.

“From the day he came to the club he was full of energy,” Thompson told reporters on Wednesday.

“He wanted to ask questions from a lot of experienced players and was harassing the coaches straight away, trying to gain as much game knowledge as he could in that first year when he wasn’t able to play AFL footy.”

Crouch collected 31 disposals in the SANFL last weekend, with Thompson describing him as a “natural footballer”.

“He knows where to run,” he said.

“Defensively he can still get better, which comes with age.

“The teams that he has played in growing up, he has been the dominant player for those teams so he has probably been able to play the game one way where at this level you can’t afford to be just an offensive player.

“I’m hoping we will see in the team real soon.”

Thompson said the Crows would travel to Brisbane keen to make amends for their round one loss to Essendon, which was followed by an Easter weekend without a game.

“It’s not ideal playing your first game and then having a week off,” he said.

“Perfect world, you would like to play the following week and put it behind you. We haven’t been able to do that, there has been a lot of media hype around our performance in round one.

“There were a lot of areas we need to get better at.”