New GM of High Performance Brett Burton says the early return of several senior players to pre-season training is a sign of the strong culture being developed at Adelaide.

Captain Taylor Walker, leaders Rory Sloane and Daniel Talia, and defenders Brodie Smith, Sam Shaw and Matthew Jaensch joined their 1-4 year teammates on day one of training on Monday.

Players with five or more years of AFL experience aren’t required at the Club until Tuesday, December 1. Burton said it was “fantastic” to see several senior hit the track ahead of time.

“It was certainly pleasing when those guys called last week to say that they wanted to join in training (this week),” Burton said on Monday.

“It shows that there’s a good leadership culture around the footy club. The younger guys get a buzz out of that. They (the senior players) are there to show the young guys the standard but also to (demonstrate) that they’re all in this together.

“It was good to see ‘Tals’, ‘Tex’, ‘Sloaney’ and a few other boys come back early. They won’t be in the whole program for the full week, but they’ll be there for the footy sessions.”

Trade Period recruits Paul Seedsman, Troy Menzel, Curtly Hampton and Dean Gore also completed their first official training sessions with the Club.

Rookies Hugh Greenwood and Alex Keath also joined their teammates on AAMI Stadium.

The players avoided a time trial on day one, but will complete the testing once the full group returns.

Burton said he was pleased with how the younger players had presented themselves after the break.

“You kind of wait until you get the time trial done (to make a better assessment) so we’ll wait and see what that shows us … but generally, the guys looked in pretty good condition today,” he said.

Several players, including Brad Crouch (foot), Sam Jacobs (elbow), Cam Ellis-Yolmen (finger), Nathan van Berlo (shoulder) and Troy Menzel (hip) will have modified programs in the lead-up to Christmas as they recover from injury.

“We certainly had low injury rates last season, but we’ve got quite a few players that have come off off-season surgery or modified programs over the off-season,” Burton said.

“It’s not an issue, it’s just about managing their load. They’re all individualised (programs). You need a bit of flexibility through this period.”

Midfielder Brad Crouch trained indoors on Monday as he continues his recovery from a foot complaint.

“We have to be careful and make sure we progress him (Crouch) along slowly because the last thing we need is a setback,” Burton said.

“We’ll lean more on the cautious side with Brad. We want him to be around here for 12-15 years and playing 200 games.”

The session was Senior Coach Don Pyke’s first in charge of the Crows. The footballs were out from the start of training.

Burton said the Club would balance learning a new game plan with conditioning in the shortened pre-season.

“When you’re coming in with a shortened period and you’ve got a new coach and new high performance manager, you’ve just got to manage your time to make sure you’re ticking off both boxes and that’s ingraining the game plan and also getting conditioned,” he said.

“Ten weeks is enough to be able to do the conditioning and I guess the game plan will evolve as time goes on.”